How Old Is My Bulova Watch? The Complete Date Code & Identification Guide

If your Bulova is from 1950 or later, the Bulova date code on the case back tells you the year in about ten seconds. Open the case back, find the two-character code stamped on the inside or on the movement, and read off the year from the table below. That is the simple version.

If your Bulova is from before 1950, Bulova watch identification takes more work. Bulova used at least four different dating systems and several different Bulova serial number formats in its first 130 years of operation, and a typical vintage Bulova carries four separate numbers on the case, movement, and dial. This guide covers all of them, from the pocket watches Joseph Bulova was selling on Maiden Lane in 1875 to the quartz Lunar Pilots Citizen ships today.

The Quick Answer: Reading a Bulova Date Code (1950 to Present)

From 1950 onward, every Bulova carries a two-character alphanumeric Bulova date code. The letter tells you the decade. The digit tells you the year inside that decade. A Bulova date code of M3 means 1963. N7 is 1977. B4 is 2014.

The Bulova date code is usually stamped twice: once on the movement (visible only with the case back off), and once on the inside of the case back. When the two codes agree, you have your year. When they differ by more than one year, something has been replaced and the case mark is generally the more reliable of the two.

Bulova Date Code Table (1950 to 2029)

Letter	Decade	0	1	2	3	4	5	6	7	8	9
L	1950s	1950	1951	1952	1953	1954	1955	1956	1957	1958	1959
M	1960s	1960	1961	1962	1963	1964	1965	1966	1967	1968	1969
N	1970s	1970	1971	1972	1973	1974	1975	1976	1977	1978	1979
P	1980s	1980	1981	1982	1983	1984	1985	1986	1987	1988	1989
T	1990s	1990	1991	1992	1993	1994	1995	1996	1997	1998	1999
A	2000s	2000	2001	2002	2003	2004	2005	2006	2007	2008	2009
B	2010s	2010	2011	2012	2013	2014	2015	2016	2017	2018	2019
C	2020s	2020	2021	2022	2023	2024	2025	2026	2027	2028	2029

Bulova used L, M, N, P, T, A, B, C. The letters O, Q, R, and S were skipped, almost certainly because they look too much like other characters when stamped small. O collides with the digit zero. Q, R, and S all look like each other under loupe magnification on a 60-year-old movement plate.

A few catches worth knowing

After 2000, Bulova rolled the letter sequence back to A. So a code of A8 could mean 1948 (a transitional pre-system stamp, see below) or 2008. Case style decides this for you instantly. The same caveat applies to A0 through A9 (1948 through 1949 if the watch is mechanical and gold-filled with a small case, 2000 through 2009 if it’s a modern steel quartz).

The system is currently in C, which covers the 2020s. A new Bulova bought in 2026 will read C6.

Where to Find the Bulova Date Code on Your Watch

For most vintage Bulovas, the Bulova date code is in two places:

1. On the movement. Pop the case back off and look at the movement plate. The two-character code is stamped somewhere on the plate, often near the balance wheel or under the dial. It indicates the year the movement was assembled.
2. Inside the case back. A second Bulova date code stamp lives on the inside surface of the case back itself. It indicates the year the case was finished.

For watches from the 1950s and earlier, you may also see a Bulova serial number alongside the date code. Bulova mostly stopped putting serial numbers on movements after 1932, but a small number of pieces carry them into the mid 1930s.

If you don’t want to open the case back yourself, almost any watchmaker or jeweler will pop it for you for free or for a couple of dollars. You don’t need to send it to a Bulova service center.

The Pre-1950 Bulova Date Code: The Symbol System (1924 to 1949)

Between 1924 and 1949, Bulova stamped a small graphic symbol on the movement instead of a letter code. This pre-alphanumeric Bulova date code gives you the year inside a decade, but it does not tell you which decade. The same symbol repeats every nine or ten years. A triangle could mean 1926, 1935, or 1945. A circle could mean 1925, 1934, or 1944.

To narrow down the decade, you use the case style, dial design, hand style, lug shape, and the movement caliber. A circle-stamped Bulova with a 10AN caliber, a stepped Art Deco gold-filled cushion case, and Breguet numerals is a 1934. The same circle on a 10BPAC center-seconds caliber with a thin round dress case is a 1944. The decade follows from the design.

The symbols, year by year

Year	Symbol
1925	Circle
1926	Triangle
1927	Square
1928	Crescent moon
1929	Rounded shield
1930	Horned circle
1931	Rectangular shield
1932	Rounded capital T
1933	Capital X
1934	Circle (repeats 1925)
1935	Triangle (repeats 1926)
1936	Square (repeats 1927)
1937	Right-pointing arrow
1938	Crescent moon (repeats 1928)
1939	Rounded shield (repeats 1929)
1940	Horned circle (repeats 1930)
1941	Asterisk or star
1942	Rounded T (repeats 1932)
1943	Capital X (repeats 1933)
1944	Circle (repeats 1925, 1934)
1945	Triangle (repeats 1926, 1935)
1946	Square (repeats 1927, 1936)
1947	“47” stamped as a numeric code (transition)
1948	“A8” (system transition begins)
1949	“A9”

For an exact visual reference, the canonical symbol chart is hosted as an image on MyBulova.com’s date codes page. If you can’t tell whether what you’re looking at is a horned circle or a rounded shield, that’s where to go.

The system transitioned to the alphanumeric format starting in 1947, with some 1948 and 1949 watches carrying A8 and A9 stamps. By 1950 the symbol system was retired entirely in favor of L0 through L9.

The Bulova Serial Number System on the Case (1926 to 1949)

While the movement carried a date code symbol, the Bulova serial number on the case carried a different signal. From 1926 through 1949, the first digit of the case Bulova serial number corresponds to the last digit of the year of manufacture.

A serial starting with 4 was made in 1934 or 1944. A serial starting with 8 was made in 1928, 1938, or 1948. The decade, again, comes from style.

If the movement symbol and case serial first digit disagree by more than a year, you are probably looking at a watch where one component has been replaced. The case mark is generally considered slightly more reliable than the movement symbol when both are present and they’re close to each other.

A few exceptions are worth noting. Some 1930s stainless steel and solid gold cases use irregular numbering. Pre-1926 cases have no serial system at all. Patent dates stamped inside cases are not manufacture dates: ignore them.

Ladies’ Watches Used Letter Bulova Serial Numbers Instead

Ladies’ Bulovas from 1940 through 1949 used a letter prefix on the case Bulova serial number instead of a digit.

Year	Ladies’ case letter
1940	A
1941	B
1942	C
1943	D
1944	E
1945	F
1946	G
1947	H
1948	I
1949	J

The letter system was case-only and ladies’-only during this period. The movement still carried the symbol code described above. The system ended in 1949 when both men’s and ladies’ production rolled into the universal L0 through L9 alphanumeric format in 1950.

The Four Numbers on a Vintage Bulova (Date Code, Serial, Caliber, Model)

A common point of confusion in Bulova watch identification: a typical vintage Bulova carries four different identifiers, and they all do different things.

Number	Where it appears	What it tells you
Movement Bulova serial number	Stamped on the movement plate	Used pre-1932 to date the movement individually. Bulova stopped using these on most movements after 1932, when the date code symbol system took over.
Movement caliber	Stamped on the movement (e.g. “10AK”, “11AF”, “214”)	The movement family, useful for service and for identifying what’s inside.
Bulova date code	Stamped on the movement, and on the case-back interior	The year the watch was assembled, in the symbol or alphanumeric Bulova date code system described above.
Case Bulova serial number	Stamped inside the case back	Pre-1950, the first digit (or letter, for 1940s ladies’) tells you the year of case manufacture.

You may also see a hand-inscribed Roman numeral identifier under the top edge of some case interiors. This is a Bulova quality control mark: it matches the last three digits of the case serial number. Its presence is supporting evidence that the original case and movement have stayed together since the factory.

Modern Bulovas (post-1980) carry a reference number like 96B107 instead. More on those below.

Modern Bulova Reference Numbers (1980s to Today)

After Citizen acquired Bulova in 2008, and increasingly through the late 1980s and 1990s before that, Bulova adopted a multi-character reference number system stamped on the outside case back.

A typical modern reference looks like 96B251 or 98A123.

• The first two digits (96, 98, 97, and so on) indicate the collection or category.
• The letter indicates the segment within that collection. Community convention reads B as men’s, L as ladies’, A as automatic or Accutron-series, M as mid-size. Bulova has never published an official key, so treat these as observed conventions rather than rules.
• The trailing digits are a sequential model identifier inside that line.

For modern Bulovas, the reference number is your single most useful piece of information. You can punch a reference into Bulova’s customer service line (1-800-A-BULOVA) or into the search field on bulova.com and get the model name and specifications instantly.

The date code system (L through C) continues to live on modern watches as well, often stamped in much smaller print on the inside or outer rim of the case back.

Before 1924: The Hard Era

If your Bulova predates 1924, you’re in the hardest era to date and identify. There is no formal date code. There is no consistent serial number system. The dating evidence is circumstantial.

The strongest single clue is the movement signature:

• Movements stamped “Bulova W. Co.” are from before April 1923, when the company was still incorporated as the J. Bulova Company.
• Movements stamped “Bulova Watch Co.” are from April 1923 or later, after the formal reorganization into Bulova Watch Company, Inc.
• A few very early Bulovas have movements with no Bulova signature at all. This is one of the rare cases where the absence of branding is not a fake red flag.

Case-maker stamps help bracket the era further. Early Bulovas were cased by Wadsworth Watch Case Co. and by American Standard Watch Case Co. Bulova owned American Standard outright by 1931, and an “American Standard, Aug. 1, 1918” stamp on a case interior indicates production from 1918 or later.

Caliber narrows the range. The 10AN caliber ran from 1925 to 1937. Earlier Swiss-import calibers turn up on 1910s and very early 1920s Bulovas.

Style cues finish the job. Small round or cushion cases, wire or wire-loop lugs, fired enamel dials, and Roman or Arabic numerals are all consistent with 1915 through 1925.

A pre-1924 Bulova is not impossible to date. It just takes the combination of movement signature, case maker, caliber range, and design era to land within a few years.

Bulova Calibers: The Movement Inside

The two-character date code tells you the year the movement was finished. The caliber number stamped on the movement plate tells you which Bulova movement family the watch uses. The caliber matters because it determines service parts, jewel count, common faults, and value.

Bulova caliber names follow a pattern: a number indicating size in lignes (the old Swiss watchmaking unit, where one ligne is about 2.26 millimeters), followed by letter codes. A 10AK is a 10½-ligne caliber in the “A” family, “K” sub-revision. The 10½-ligne size is the standard mid-century men’s movement size. Smaller calibers (7AA, 8AE) tend to be ladies’ or smaller men’s, and larger numbers tend to be later automatics and Accutrons.

Common Mechanical Calibers

Caliber	Years active	Type	Jewels	Where you see it
10AN	1925 to 1937	Manual wind	7, 15, 17, 21	Early Lone Eagles, Spartan, mid-1930s men’s
10AK	Late 1930s to early 1950s	Manual wind	15, 17, 21	Wartime and post-war men’s
10AKC	1940s	Manual wind, center-seconds	17, 21	Center-seconds variant of 10AK
7AA	1947 to 1953	Manual wind	21	Mid-size men’s
7AK	1936 to 1950	Manual wind	21	Smaller men’s and ladies’
10BPAC	1955 to 1959	Automatic, center-seconds	23	The famous Bulova 23 self-winding line. Six-position adjusted, 18,000 vph, 41-hour reserve.
10BZAC	1959 to 1963	Automatic, center-seconds	23 or 30	Successor to 10BPAC. The 30-jewel variant powers top-tier Beau Brummel dress watches.
11AC	1955 to 1958	Manual wind, center-seconds	17	Common 1950s men’s
11AF	1959 to 1967	Manual wind, center-seconds	17	Standard 1960s mechanical men’s

Accutron (Tuning Fork) Calibers

The Accutron line broke from mechanical movements entirely. These are electronic tuning-fork watches, vibrating a small steel tuning fork at 360 Hz to drive the gear train.

Caliber	Year	Format	Notes
214	1961 to 1977	28.7 mm × 5.5 mm	Original Accutron. No crown: time set via case back. Sub-variants 214H (hacking), 214HN (hack + anti-magnetic, used in Astronaut).
218	1967 to 1977	29.7 mm × 4.9 mm	Thinner, more widely produced Accutron. Sub-variants 218D (date), 2182 (day-date).
219	1972 onward	Tuning fork	Budget Accutron with plastic components.
221 / 230	1972 to 1973	Tuning fork	Smaller-format ladies’ Accutron calibers.

A movement stamped 214 is from no later than 1977. A 218 is post-1967. A 2182 indicates day-date complication and is most commonly seen in the Devil Sea / Deep Sea Accutron.

The Bulova 23 and the 30 Jewels Self-Winding Line

The dial that reads “23 / Self Winding” or “23 Jewels Self-Winding” is one of the most-searched vintage Bulova categories on the internet, and for good reason. The Bulova 23 was the brand’s flagship automatic line from 1955 to the early 1960s, designed to compete with high-grade Swiss automatics on accuracy and finish without commanding Swiss prices.

Variants are designated by a single letter on the dial: 23 “A”, 23 “B”, 23 “FW”, and so on. The letter typically encodes a dial or case variant rather than a major specification change. All share the same caliber family.

The movement was almost always a 10BPAC (1955 to 1959) or its successor the 10BZAC (1959 to 1963). Both are six-position adjusted, run at 18,000 vph, and offer roughly 40 to 41 hours of power reserve.

The 30 Jewels Self-Winding line is the same family with an upgraded movement. Many Beau Brummel and other top-of-line dress Bulovas use the 30-jewel 10BZ family. The added jewels are functional rather than decorative: extra cap jewels on the rotor and barrel arbor that genuinely reduce friction.

Clean Bulova 23 examples with original dials trade in the $300 to $800 range today, depending on case material and condition. Solid gold variants run higher. The line is a strong sweet spot for entry-level vintage collecting.

Major Vintage Bulova Model Lines

Bulova historically did not engrave model names on its watches. The model name lives in period catalogues, line books, and the MyBulova.com database. The list below covers the lines that actually show up regularly in vintage Bulova hunting.

Lone Eagle (1927 to early 1940s)

Originally named the Conqueror in late 1926, renamed the Lone Eagle on June 17, 1927 to ride Charles Lindbergh’s solo Atlantic crossing one month earlier. Bulova had offered Lindbergh a $1,000 prize for the flight in 1926 and within 48 hours of his landing took 30,000 orders for the rebadged watch. Five thousand sold in three days, fifty thousand by 1930.

At least six different Lone Eagle models followed through the late 1930s. Caliber is almost always 10AN. The earliest examples shipped with a facsimile of Lindbergh’s thank-you letter in the original box.

Beau Brummel (late 1940s to early 1970s)

Bulova’s top-tier dress line, in production for more than two decades. Diamond-set dial configurations, 21, 23, or 30 jewels, solid or gold-filled cases. The 30-jewel Beau Brummel with a 10BZAC automatic is the apex of Bulova mechanical dress watches.

Snorkel, Oceanographer, and the Devil Diver (1961 to early 1970s)

Bulova introduced its first purpose-built dive watch in 1961, using a Compressor case from Ervin Piquerez SA in Switzerland. The standard Compressor case carried a 600-foot depth rating; Bulova pushed the same case to 666 feet, which is where the Devil Diver nickname comes from. Any Bulova diver rated to 666 feet is a Devil Diver.

In 1968 the line gained the Snorkel name with its cross-hair dial, tritium-lume hour markers, and bicolor red 15-minute timing arc. In 1969 the dial picked up the Oceanographer designation: the canonical Devil Diver form factor.

A smaller-depth Snorkel 333 Feet ran parallel for less hardcore use.

Bulova reissued a faithful version in 2018 as the Archive Series 666 Devil Diver, limited to 666 pieces with an orange dial. A contemporary Oceanographer GMT has been in current production since 2022.

The Accutron Sub-Models

Accutron was its own brand-within-the-brand from 1960 to 1977, then again from 2020 onward under Citizen. Major sub-models, in rough order of collector interest:

• Spaceview. Originally a sales tool: dealers showed the tuning fork through a dialless watch to prove the technology was real. Demand made it a regular model from 1961. The Spaceview has no dial. The exposed green PCB and tuning fork are the dial. Markings are reverse-printed on the underside of the crystal. Stainless steel from 1962.
• Astronaut. 1962 to 1977. GMT complication with a 24-hour rotating bezel and a 24-hour hand. Issued quietly to CIA Lockheed A-12 OXCART pilots. Fourteen documented letter sub-variants run from A through T across four type configurations.
• Astronaut Mark II. 1970 onward. Square cushion case, twin crowns. Uses the 218 caliber instead of the original 214.
• Railroad Approved. 1962 onward. The first wristwatch ever certified for U.S. railroad service. Dial reads “Railroad Approved” in standard numerals. Used by railroad workers to synchronize trains and station clocks.
• Deep Sea (sometimes “Deep Sea AB”). 1969 to 1971, with most production in 1970. Uses the 2182 day-date caliber. Case is 41 mm by 45 mm, 20 mm lugs, 14.5 mm thick with a super-dome crystal. Rated to 666 feet, making it the Accutron version of the Devil Diver. Date codes typically run M8 through N0.
• GMT and Bal Harbour. Smaller-volume regional and dress variants, mid-to-late 1960s.

Total Accutron production from 1961 to 1977 was over 5 million pieces across all sub-models.

If you have a Railroad Approved Accutron and want a deeper buyer’s reference, see our dedicated Bulova Accutron Railroad Approved page.

The Dress Watch Lines

These lines all show up regularly in vintage Bulova hunting. They are not as iconic as the Lone Eagle or the Accutron but they are common, generally affordable, and well-built.

• President and Presidential. Multiple generations from the 1950s to the 1970s. Dress watches with date complications.
• Senator. Recurring 1960s dress line. Solid mid-tier.
• Commodore. 1950s to 60s dress watch line. Often gold-filled.
• Yankee Clipper, Royal Clipper, Jet Clipper, Sea Clipper. 1955 to early 1960s. Share a distinctive case style with sculptural lugs.
• His Excellency and Excellency. 1940s to 1950s premium dress.
• Date King. 1964 to 1965 date-window line.
• Sea King. 1969-era day-date automatic.
• Academy Award. 1950 to 1954 licensed line (Bulova paid $154,000 in licensing fees over five years), roughly 25 ladies’ models and 14 men’s.

A note on aviation watches

The strong Bulova aviation lineage is not the Sky King (a minor 1952 model). The real aviation Bulovas are:

1. The A-11 and A-15 military pilot watches issued in WWII (1942 to 1945).
2. The Lunar Pilot: Apollo 15 commander Dave Scott’s personal Bulova chronograph (model 88510/01), worn on the lunar surface in 1971 and sold at auction in 2016 for $1.625 million. Bulova has produced modern Lunar Pilot reissues since 2016, currently at 43.5 mm with the NP20 high-frequency quartz movement.

Country of Origin: What “Made in” Actually Means

A consistent source of confusion: a case stamped “Bulova” with a “Made in USA” mark on the case back almost never indicates an American-made movement. Bulova ran a movement factory in Biel, Switzerland from 1912 through 1983. For more than seventy years, the typical “American” Bulova carried a Swiss movement.

Here is how to read the “Made in” question by era.

Era	Movement origin	Final assembly
1912 to 1923	Biel, Switzerland	NYC
1923 to 1949	Biel	NYC, Woodside, and Flushing NY plants
1950 to 1977 (Accutron era)	Biel for mechanical, US for some Accutron assembly	New York plants
1977 to 1983	Biel	New York and contracted assembly
1983 to 2008	Biel closed in 1983; ETA and other Swiss suppliers, some Japanese	Predominantly Asian assembly by late period
2008 onward (Citizen ownership)	Miyota / Citizen movements (Japan), with limited Swiss Accu•Swiss line 2012 to 2015	Japan, China, Hong Kong

So when a vintage Bulova says “Bulova Watch Co. Made in USA” on the case back: read it as case manufacture and final assembly in the United States, with a Swiss movement inside. That’s what the brand was for most of the 20th century.

Frequently Asked Questions

Reference Material and Further Reading

For the deepest community references on vintage Bulova, the two essential sites are:

• MyBulova.com. The most thorough public database of vintage Bulova watches, organized by year, caliber, model name, and serial number. The community has cataloged thousands of individual watches. This is where you go to identify a specific watch.
• Watchophilia.com. Encyclopedic reference for movements, case signatures, model series, and dating. The text reference for facts the MyBulova chart shows visually.

For the National Association of Watch and Clock Collectors (NAWCC) forum, mb.nawcc.org is the most rigorous community source. Threads there have established many of the corrections and edge cases that show up in the consumer references.

For internal cross-reference, the related OTTUHR identification guides:

• How to Identify and Value a Vintage Watch: The Complete Guide
• Hamilton Watch Serial Numbers: How to Date Your Timepiece
• Longines Serial Numbers: The Complete Reference Guide
• Wittnauer Watch Serial Numbers: Production Date Guide (Bulova acquired Wittnauer in 2001)
• The Rise and Fall of American Watchmaking: A Complete History (broader context on Bulova’s American era)
• How the Quartz Crisis Nearly Ended Swiss Watchmaking (why the Accutron 218 was a survival vehicle)

Bulova built more than 150 years of watches across at least five distinct Bulova date code and Bulova serial number systems. Once you understand which system covers which era, Bulova watch identification goes from a research project back to about ten seconds.