TAG Heuer 980.031 Night-Diver

James Bond (played by Timothy Dalton) probably wears a TAG Heuer 980.031 Night-Diver watch in The Living Daylights (1987).

The watch doesn't get much screentime and can only barely be seen during the opening sequence in Gibraltar, when Bond is riding on on the roof of a Land Rover Series III.

Identification of the watch has been done by Bond watch expert Dell Deaton and Paul Gavin and Calibre11, and you can read a full account of the research in this article on Calibre11.com.

According to their research, the most likely model is the TAG Heuer 980.031 with black PVD case and full luminescent dial with darkened indices. The dial appears white with a slight yellow hue in daylight, but glows in the dark if it has received enough sunlight. 

The TAG Heuer 980.031 Night-Diver has a quartz movement and a small 36mm case and a black metal jubilee strap.

Since there is no proper photo or screenshot of the watch in the film that shows the details of the dial, we can't be sure if Bond's watch has the "Heuer" logo or the "TAG Heuer" logo.

In the same film, General Pushkin also wears a TAG Heuer watch, which actually has a gadget feature installed by the Soviet equivalent of Q branch: if the general pushes the crown, an alarm goes off with his private security guard.

The company began as Uhrenmanufaktur Heuer AG, founded in 1860 by Edouard Heuer in St-Imier, Switzerland. Watches like the famous Monaco model worn by Steve McQueen had the Heuer logo on the dial. In 1985, TAG Group purchased a majority stake in the company, forming TAG Heuer. In the years that followed, the dial changed to the "TAG Heuer" logo. The TAG Heuer 980.031 is available both with Heuer and TAG Heuer logo.

2021 updated model

In 2021, TAG Heuer released an updated model of the Night-Diver as a new variant of its Aquaracer Night Diver Professional 300 Collection, ref. WBP201D.FT6197. This watch has a 43mm stainless-steel case, bezel, crown, caseback and clasp all coated in matte black diamond-like carbon (DLC). The watch also features the luminescent dial as a nod to the Heuer watches from the 1980s with that feature.

Available for $3,350 (retail price), or on sale at JomaShop ($2,800).

Affordable alternative

A nice looking alternative is the Vague Watch Co. Diver's Son. This black diver's watch has a similar dial, bezel and hands.

This small Quartz watch (36mm case, similar to the original TAG watch) comes on a black rubber strap and is provided with an alternative black Nato strap, but to make it more like the TAG Heuer watch you could try to find a Black Jubilee strap on eBay (you need one with an 18mm width, and curved end links).

Available at Uncrate ($250)

Note that this watch, with a 36mm case, is a small watch compared to all the modern Bond diver's watches.

TAG Heuer in other films

Heuer and TAG Heuer have appeared in many other films and several celebrities have been hired to endorse the brand, see an overview of movie sightings on Watch-ID.com.