Since 2019, Tutima has slowly turned its Flieger from a single tool-watch reference into a real pilot watch family. That first contemporary version traded some of the brand’s military background for a cleaner time-and-date layout, and the 41mm Flieger Automatics that followed gave the line a recognizable everyday shape. Now the Glashütte brand is filling in the gap that kept coming up in collector circles: something smaller and lighter. That watch is the Flieger T5, a 38.5mm titanium take on the contemporary Flieger.
Tutima’s aviation creds trace back to Glashütte in the 1940s, and the brand leans on that history whenever a new Flieger lands. The company points to 1941, when it says it built Germany’s first two-pusher flyback chronograph, the watch that eventually lent the modern line its Flieger name. That heritage holds up at a high level, though I tend to keep the marketing story and the watch in front of us in separate lanes. The T5 sits in contemporary territory, a modern all-rounder wearing pilot cues, with the smaller titanium case as the real story.
At 38.5mm wide and 12.5mm thick, the grade 5 titanium case is the most compact the contemporary Flieger has come, and the material should keep it light on the wrist. Tutima went mostly satin-brushed with polished accents on the bezel, crown, and central bracelet link. You get a large fluted screw-down crown, a domed sapphire crystal with AR coating, 100m of water resistance, and a display caseback. The black and blue lacquered dials handle legibility well, with a thick coat of Super-LumiNova across the orientation triangle, baton markers, Arabic numerals, and lance-shaped hands. That’s also where the debate starts. Between the full run of minute numerals, the Arabic hours, and a date window at 6 o’clock, some flieger fans will read the dial as busier than they’d like, while others will see a faithful cockpit look. Both takes are fair.
Powering the T5 is Tutima’s calibre 330, based on the ETA 2836, running at 4Hz with 25 jewels and a 41-hour power reserve. It hacks, it drives the date and central seconds, and it’s the kind of base that stays easy to service down the road. Tutima dresses it up with a rhodium-plated rotor and a gold “T,” all visible through that sapphire caseback.
This is where readers will land in different spots. A 41-hour reserve sits below where much of the competition has moved, and putting a familiar ETA base on display invites the obvious question of whether the window earns its keep at this price. On the other hand, a proven, serviceable movement in a light titanium case with this level of finishing makes for a reasonable package. We’ll let you sort out which side of that you come down on.
The Flieger T5 arrives in three references: black dial on bracelet (6109-02), blue dial on bracelet (6109-04), and blue dial on a light brown Horween leather strap (6109-03). European pricing lands at EUR 2,350 on the titanium bracelet and EUR 1,950 on the strap. US pricing hasn’t been confirmed, so I’ll hold off on converting those figures until Tutima posts something official. For now, the T5 reads as an attractive expansion of a line that’s steadily found its footing, and whether the titanium and the trimmer case do enough to pull it out from under the radar is the part still left to play out.
Co-Founder & Senior Editor
Michael Peñate is an American writer, photographer, and podcaster based in Seattle, Washington. His work typically focuses on the passage of time and the tools we use to connect with that very journey. From aviation to music and travel, his interests span a multitude of disciplines that often intersect with the world of watches – and the obsessive culture behind collecting them.