Why the Solitaire Engagement Ring Is Still the World's Most Chosen Style

Solitaires aren't the adrenaline junkies of the engagement ring world. No halos, no pavé, no dramatic flourishes competing for attention. Just a stone and a band.

And yet — year after year — it's the style more people choose than any other.

We've had this conversation hundreds of times across our Pretoria, Sandton, and Cape Town studios. Customers who came in certain they wanted something elaborate, and left with a solitaire. Customers who knew from the start. The reasons are never identical, but they tend to orbit the same five things.

Reason 1 – A solitaire is the quintessential engagement ring style.

Close your eyes for a second. Travel back to a time when you weren't engagement ring shopping. Picture an engagement ring. Not one you've seen on Pinterest or Instagram — just the first image that surfaces. What do you see?

A single diamond. Simple band. Nothing else.

That's a solitaire. And there's a reason it's the first thing your brain reaches for.

It's timeless. Its evergreen. 

Solitaires never go out of style, they work on any size hand/finger, and no one will need to guess what your relationship status is. 

It’s obviously an engagement ring.

Reason 2 – “I want the focus to be on the diamond.”

A solitaire makes one thing clear: this ring is about the diamond. No halo competing for attention. No intricate metalwork pulling the eye. Just the stone, doing what it does.

And that's a completely defensible design philosophy — because a great diamond doesn't need backup.

Here's where it gets interesting. Lab-grown diamonds have quietly made the upper end of the market accessible in a way it never was before. Colours that would have been out of reach five years ago aren't anymore. Sizes that used to require a serious compromise elsewhere in the budget now don't. If the diamond is going to be the centrepiece, you might as well make it a centrepiece worth staring at.

Which brings us to the stone itself — because it's worth pausing on what you're actually dealing with here.

These diamonds witnessed the evolution of basic algae into complex life. They felt the violent split of Pangea into the seven continents we know today. They survived the Ice Ages, the age of the dinosaurs, mass extinctions that reset life on earth entirely.

And then, over a billion years later, one surfaced. And you get to choose it.

A solitaire just makes sure nothing gets in the way of that.

Reason 3 - “I prefer a simple and minimalistic approach to design”

There's a reason Dieter Rams is still being quoted in design schools fifty years later. A reason the original Porsche 911 silhouette has barely changed. A reason the most expensive restaurants in the world put three things on a plate and charge you accordingly.

Restraint, done well, is its own form of extravagance.

A solitaire sits in that tradition. The absence of clutter isn't a lack of ambition — it's a design decision. Every element that isn't there was left out on purpose. What remains has to be perfect, and that's exactly the point.

This is also where the craft becomes visible in a way that busy designs can actually hide. The profile of the band. The geometry of the setting. The height the stone sits at. The way the prongs are shaped and finished. In a solitaire, there's nowhere to hide — and a jeweller who knows what they're doing wouldn't want to.

So yes, the diamond is the star. But the setting is the stage — and a well-designed stage doesn't upstage the performance. It elevates it.

If you're drawn to minimalism, a solitaire is the obvious starting point. But don't mistake simple for basic. The two have nothing to do with each other.

Reason 4 - Versatility

A solitaire doesn't lock you in. That's the point.

Because the ring doesn't commit hard to a specific style, almost everything works with it. Classic bands, vintage bands, bolder modern bands — scan through our Instagram and you'll see how many combinations land beautifully. The engagement ring sets the tone without dictating the direction.

Stack rings take this further. Two or three complementary diamond bands and you can dress the whole thing up or down depending on the occasion. It's the same ring doing completely different work.

Metal colours are also fair game in a way they aren't with more elaborate designs. A large, detailed rose gold engagement ring can make a platinum band look like an afterthought. A solitaire's band sits at a similar weight to most additional bands, so switching up the metal colour feels intentional rather than mismatched.

Then there's the diamond shape question — and this is one people don't always consider upfront. A solitaire is shape-agnostic. Round, oval, emerald, pear, cushion, radiant — each reads completely differently in a solitaire setting. Which means you can fall in love with a stone first and build around it, rather than the other way around.

Practically speaking, solitaires also keep wear and tear to a minimum. No large areas of intricate metalwork means less to snag, less to maintain, and less that can go wrong over years of daily wear. Most women find they never need to take it off — it's low-profile enough to handle real life without feeling precious about it.

Reason 5 - They’re a safe bet for gents on solo missions.

We love it when couples come in together. But we understand that's not always how it goes — some guys want the full surprise, and we respect that.

If you're going in alone, a solitaire is your safest move by a significant margin. Here's why we say that with such confidence.

We once had a client — let's call him Danie — who came in absolutely certain about his vision. His girlfriend had a special relationship with owls. Deep, meaningful, theirs. So naturally, the owl needed to be on the ring. Simple math, right?

We asked, gently, whether she knew about this plan.

She did not.

Three weeks later Danie was on one knee. She said yes to him. She said considerably less yes to the owl. We're not entirely sure the owl made it out of the box before negotiations began.

A week later she was in the studio starting from scratch.

The moral isn't that personalised rings are wrong — we make stunning, elaborate, deeply personal pieces every day. The moral is that without her input, you're guessing. And some guesses are owls.

A solitaire eliminates the risk. If she loves vintage, she adds a vintage band. If she wants more presence, you stack. And if she genuinely wants something completely different — we offer 100% credit on your raw materials, making a remake far more affordable than starting cold.

It's also easy to resize if the fit isn't perfect.

When in doubt: platinum solitaire. You can always build from there.

So, is a solitaire right for you?

If you've read this far, it just might be.

The solitaire is the most chosen engagement ring style in the world for reasons that have nothing to do with lack of imagination — and everything to do with knowing exactly what you want. One stone. Nothing in its way. Everything riding on the diamond.

Browse our solitaire designs here, or if you already have something specific in mind, come talk to us. Over 70% of what we make is fully custom — you'll work one-on-one with a designer from first sketch to final piece, across our studios in Pretoria, Sandton, and Cape Town.

Pretoria: (012) 111 0525
Sandton: (010) 020 6811
Cape Town: (021) 013 7697

Or start a conversation online — whichever is easiest.

For anything else, feel free to reach me directly at johan@poggenpoel.com.

Take care.
Johan Poggenpoel