When TAG Heuer and Time+Tide released the first Sundowner back in November 2024, all 250 pieces were gone in 24 hours. A solar-powered Aquaracer in sandblasted titanium, with rose gold accents and a khaki strap, inspired by the Australian outback, turned out to be exactly what people wanted.
Well, almost exactly.
The one complaint I kept hearing, and the one I had myself, was that it wasn’t mechanical. Solar is practical. It’s also not what gets most watch enthusiasts excited. So two years later the Sundowner is back, and this time around TAG Heuer and Time+Tide listened. The Aquaracer Professional 300 x Time+Tide Sundowner II is automatic, it’s a proper 300-meter diver, and it comes on either a fitted rubber strap or a full titanium bracelet. It’s not a new colorway of the old watch. It’s a different watch that happens to share a name and a mood.
The Sundowner II is built on the Aquaracer Professional 300, which means a case that measures 42mm wide, 12mm thick and 48mm lug-to-lug. That’s a step up from the 40mm original, and on paper it had me a little nervous. I have a 6.75-inch wrist, and 42mm is usually where I start paying attention. But the case is Grade 2 titanium, sandblasted to a matte gray, and that changes things. It’s light. Not feathery, but light enough that the size never becomes the story. The lugs are short and turn down toward the wrist, so the watch sits flat and doesn’t overhang. It wears smaller than the numbers suggest.
The bezel is gray ceramic with rose gold-toned markings, and it’s the detail that ties this watch most directly to the first one. Warm, but not flashy. Water resistance is now 300 meters, up from 200. Will you ever use the extra 100 meters? Of course not. But it moves the Sundowner from a sporty watch you can swim with to a real dive watch, and that feels right for where this collaboration has gone. One small thing: the screw-down crown is steel, not titanium. You’d have to be looking for it, and I was.
And then there’s the dial. This is the star of the watch. It’s black, with wave ridges stamped directly into the brass, then a sunray finish on top of that, then a clear varnish over everything. In low light it reads as a simple black dial. Then you turn your wrist, the light catches the ridges, and the whole thing starts to move. The applied indexes, the hands and both logos are plated in 18K 5N rose gold, which is the same warm accent the original used, only here it’s sitting against black instead of a sandy tone. The first Sundowner was about the outback. This one moves to the coast, and it’s darker, sharper and, to my eye, a lot more versatile.
There’s also no date window, which I really appreciate. A date would have cut right through that wave pattern, and on a watch where the dial is doing this much work, leaving it out was the right call.
Inside is the Calibre TH31-01, an automatic movement that’s COSC-certified and has an 80-hour power reserve. The big number here is the 80 hours. Take the watch off Friday night, pick it back up Monday morning, and it’s still running. That matters more than you’d think on a watch that replaced a solar movement, because the whole appeal of the Solargraph was that you never had to think about it. Is something lost in the switch? Perhaps. The original was a grab-and-go watch in the truest sense. But this is the version enthusiasts were asking for, and I’d make the same trade every time. TAG Heuer’s line is that the first Sundowner ran on the sun and this one runs on you, and for once the marketing copy is just an accurate description.
The caseback is solid titanium with a Time+Tide logo. Sure, I would have liked to see the movement. That’s not really the point of a 300-meter diver.
The other big change is what holds it on your wrist. The original came on a khaki fabric strap that looked the part but always felt like the first thing you’d swap out. The Sundowner II gives you two options. The first is a black rubber strap that’s fitted to the case, so there’s no gap at the lugs, with a titanium folding clasp and micro-adjustment. It’s comfortable, it keeps the watch planted, and it makes the whole thing look meaner.
The second is a three-link bracelet in Grade 2 titanium, also with a folding clasp and micro-adjust, and it’s the one I’d pick. Titanium from the case all the way around to the clasp keeps the weight down, and it makes the watch feel com09-TAGplete in a way the first Sundowner never quite did.
That said, here’s the catch. The rubber strap version is limited to 450 pieces. The bracelet version is limited to 50. That’s my biggest complaint about the Sundowner II, and it has nothing to do with the watch itself.
Pricing is not insignificant, and it’s a real jump from the solar original. But you’re getting a titanium case, a ceramic bezel, a chronometer-certified movement with more than three days of power reserve and a dial that’s far more involved than anything in the regular Aquaracer lineup. The $650 difference between the strap and the bracelet is an easy call, if you can get one.
The first Sundowner was a great-looking watch with one asterisk next to it. The Sundowner II removes the asterisk. It’s bigger, it’s darker and it goes deeper, but the thing that makes it better is simpler than any of that. It’s the watch people wanted the first time.
The TAG Heuer Aquaracer Professional 300 x Time+Tide Sundowner II retails for $5,100 USD on the rubber strap (450 pieces) and $5,750 USD on the titanium bracelet (50 pieces), and it’s available this month.
