Rolex GMT-Master II Ref. 126710BLRO 'Pepsi' (Jubilee)

The red that ceramic would not hold

The red-and-blue bezel is as old as the GMT-Master itself. The first reference, the 6542, was made with Pan Am in the mid-1950s, and its two-color bezel told pilots whether the second time zone was in daylight (red) or at night (blue). The original Bakelite insert cracked and was replaced with aluminum, and aluminum Pepsi inserts carried the look through the 1675, the 16710 and every steel GMT until 2007.

Then Rolex switched to ceramic. Its Cerachrom inserts barely scratch and do not fade in sunlight, but the steel GMT-Master II of 2007, the 116710LN, came only in black. Rolex could not at first make a satisfactory red in ceramic. The first two-color ceramic GMT bezel, blue and black, arrived in 2013. The red-and-blue Pepsi came back in 2014, but only on a white gold watch, and one history suggests the gold price kept demand in line with what the factory could make.

In 2018 Rolex put it in steel.

Baselworld 2018

Rolex showed the GMT-Master II reference 126710BLRO at Baselworld in March 2018. One report that week called it the big Rolex news of the year. It was steel, on a Jubilee bracelet, with a new movement, and it cost US$9,250, or CHF 8,800 in Switzerland.

The 40 mm case was reshaped, with thinner, more tapered lugs than the earlier 'maxi' case. The bezel was the same one-piece two-color Cerachrom insert as on the white gold watch. The five-piece-link Jubilee bracelet came from vintage GMT-Masters, now fitted with an Oysterclasp and an Easylink extension that adds about 5 mm without tools.

The new caliber 3285 kept the GMT-Master II's functions: a red 24-hour hand for home time, a local hour hand that jumps in one-hour steps and a date at three o'clock. Rolex filed some ten patents during its development. It added the Chronergy escapement, a Parachrom hairspring and a 70-hour power reserve, and it is certified as a Superlative Chronometer, Rolex's standard of plus or minus two seconds a day. The 3285 replaced caliber 3186, which lacked the Chronergy escapement.

In 2021 Rolex also offered the steel Pepsi on an Oyster bracelet, alongside the Jubilee.

How the bezel is made

Rolex makes most Cerachrom bezels from zirconia. For red, its own technical document says, 'no stable mineral pigments exist that can be used with zirconia to create a uniform red.' The Pepsi insert is made instead from alumina, a softer ceramic, colored with chromium oxide and other oxides so that the whole ring starts out red.

To turn half of it blue, Rolex applies 'an aqueous solution containing various chemical compounds' to that half before the final firing. A Rolex patent lists cobalt, zinc and iron as candidates, each giving a different shade of blue; the actual formula is not public. The sources give different firing temperatures, one up to 1,600 degrees Celsius for more than 24 hours and another 850 to 1,300 degrees.

The process was never perfectly consistent. Rolex's own 2013 patent said results 'may not always be consistent,' and collectors track three shades of the steel Pepsi's bezel, called Mk1, Mk2 and Mk3. As early as 2023 there were unconfirmed reports of production problems and high failure rates for the red-and-blue insert.

Discontinued

For most of its eight years the steel Pepsi was hard to buy at a Rolex dealer. Buyers joined waiting lists, and the watch traded above its retail price on the secondary market, rising through the 2021-2022 watch boom and falling back afterward.

The end came slowly. In the months before, some authorized dealers in the United States removed the steel Pepsi from their websites. On February 28, 2026, a trade publication reported that Rolex had told its dealers there would be no more deliveries, and customers on waiting lists were being told to consider other models.

On April 14, 2026, at Watches and Wonders in Geneva, the steel 126710BLRO (on both bracelets) and the white gold 126719BLRO were gone from the catalog. Rolex announced no replacement. Collectors had expected a red-and-black 'Coke' ceramic bezel, helped by a Rolex patent published in 2024 that described a process for multicolor ceramic with red and black as the main example. It did not appear. For the first time in the ceramic era, the steel Rolex lineup had no red bezel. Accounts differ on how explicit Rolex was: one report says the company confirmed it had pulled the watch, while another says Rolex did not confirm the discontinuation.

Why it ended is not settled. A dealer specialist said what he heard in the trade, 'which is often hearsay,' was that the decision had to do with the complexity and yield of making the bezels. A strap maker's analysis raised manufacturing difficulty, room for a future Coke and Rolex's tighter sustainability standards as possible factors, and noted that its points were theories. Before the discontinuation the retail price was $11,800. Afterward, one report said a new 2024 example was trending at $32,900.

The numbers

Reference

126710BLRO (Jubilee from 2018; Oyster bracelet version from 2021)

Caliber

Rolex 3285, automatic, 4 Hz, 70-hour power reserve, Chronergy escapement, Parachrom hairspring, Superlative Chronometer

Case

40 mm Oystersteel, polished and brushed, sapphire crystal

Water resistance

100 meters

Bezel

Bidirectional 24-hour, one-piece red and blue Cerachrom (alumina-based) insert

Production years

2018 to April 2026

Production numbers

No total given in the sources consulted

Timeline

1. 1955

   The first GMT-Master, reference 6542, launches with a red-and-blue bezel for Pan Am (some sources say 1954).

2. 2007

   Ceramic bezels arrive on the steel GMT-Master II in black only; the aluminum Pepsi ends.

3. 2013

   Rolex makes its first two-color ceramic GMT bezel, the blue-and-black 116710BLNR.

4. 2014

   The ceramic Pepsi returns on the white gold 116719BLRO.

5. Mar 2018

   The steel 126710BLRO is unveiled at Baselworld on a Jubilee bracelet with caliber 3285, at US$9,250.

6. 2021

   Rolex adds an Oyster bracelet option for the steel Pepsi.

7. 2023

   Unconfirmed reports describe production difficulties and high failure rates for the red-and-blue bezel.

8. 2024

   A Rolex patent describing a red-and-black multicolor ceramic process is published.

9. Feb 28, 2026

   A trade report says Rolex has told dealers there will be no more deliveries.

10. Apr 14, 2026

    Rolex drops the 126710BLRO and the white gold 126719BLRO at Watches and Wonders in Geneva, with no replacement.

11. 2026

    Rolex marks the 100th anniversary of its waterproof Oyster case, introduced in 1926.

The world in 2018

• Feb 6, 2018

  SpaceX flies the Falcon Heavy for the first time from Kennedy Space Center.

• Feb 9, 2018

  The Winter Olympics open in Pyeongchang, South Korea (February 9-25).

• Jun 12, 2018

  The leaders of North Korea and the United States meet for the first time, in Singapore.

• Jun 14, 2018

  The FIFA World Cup opens in Russia; France wins the final on July 15.

• Oct 2, 2018

  Journalist Jamal Khashoggi is killed inside the Saudi consulate in Istanbul.

Price record

This is an asking price, not a sale. It is what a seller wanted on the date shown. Asking prices often sit above what buyers pay, but an ask is not a ceiling: a sale can land on either side of it. It is not a value.

By reference price, Rolex GMT-Master II Ref. 126710BLRO 'Pepsi' (Jubilee) is number 48 of 100 in the watches entries of the FLOAT 100. 54 of those 100 rest on a realized sale; the rest carry an asking price or a guide value, and each page says which. Rank within the FLOAT 100 itself (16 here) is editorial: how much an object defines its field, not price alone.

Did you know

• Rolex says no stable mineral pigment can make a uniform red in zirconia, so the Pepsi bezel uses a different ceramic, alumina.
• Every Pepsi insert starts out all red; the blue half is made by soaking that half in a chemical solution before firing.
• Collectors sort the steel Pepsi's bezels into three shades, Mk1, Mk2 and Mk3, because the color was never perfectly consistent.
• When the Pepsi was dropped in 2026, Rolex's steel catalog had no red bezel for the first time in the ceramic era.
• Its 2026 discontinuation came in the 100th year of the waterproof Oyster case, which Rolex introduced in 1926.