How Much Is My Gold Worth? The Complete UK Guide to Valuing Gold

Most people who ask "how much is my gold worth?" are holding a ring, a tangle of chains or a handful of coins from the back of a drawer, and carrying a figure in their head that is almost always wrong. It is usually wrong in the direction that costs them money: they either dismiss the pieces as worthless because they are broken, or they assume a high street price tag reflects what a buyer will pay.

With gold prices historically elevated through 2026, an unwanted bracelet or a single odd earring is worth more than it has been for most of living memory. But the offer you receive depends on four variables that most sellers never see written down: the exact purity of the metal, its weight to a tenth of a gram, the gold price on the day, and the margin the buyer works to. Two people with identical items can leave with very different sums simply because one understood the arithmetic and the other did not.

This guide closes that gap. It is written for anyone in the UK who wants to value gold jewellery, scrap gold, dental gold, sovereign coins or bullion before speaking to a buyer, and it covers:

• How to read UK hallmarks and establish purity
• How to weigh your items, and the difference between grams, pennyweights and troy ounces
• How the gold price per gram becomes an offer, and why every buyer pays below spot
• Worked examples with the arithmetic shown
• How sovereigns, Britannias, Krugerrands and Maple Leafs are valued
• What adds to or removes value: stones, watches, antiques, plating
• How UK tax applies when you sell gold
• How to compare buyers, and the mistakes that cost sellers money

By the end you will be able to produce your own estimate, and to recognise a fair offer when it arrives.

The Short Answer: A Four-Part Formula

What your gold is worth comes down to four numbers multiplied together.

Offer = Weight (g) × Purity × Gold price per gram × Buyer's rate

• Weight is the weight of the item in grams, ideally excluding stones and non-gold fittings.
• Purity is the proportion of the item that is actual gold, written as a decimal. 9ct gold is 0.375, 18ct is 0.75, 24ct is 0.999.
• Gold price per gram is the live price of pure gold, which changes throughout the trading day.
• Buyer's rate is the percentage of the metal's value the buyer pays out, after testing, refining, insurance and operating costs.

The first three multiply to give the melt value: what the metal in your item is worth at today's price. The fourth turns that melt value into an offer. As a quick illustration, a 10 g piece of 9ct gold with pure gold at £100 per gram has a melt value of 10 × 0.375 × £100 = £375.

Everything else in this guide is about getting each of those four numbers right, and about knowing which ones you can control.

Step 1: Establish the Purity

Purity moves the value of a piece more than almost any other factor: an 18ct item contains exactly twice as much gold as a 9ct item of the same weight, and is worth roughly twice as much. In the UK, purity is expressed either in carats (out of 24 parts) or as a three-digit fineness number, which is the proportion of gold per thousand parts.

How to read a UK hallmark

A full UK hallmark is a set of small stamped symbols, and each tells you something different. The sponsor's mark identifies the maker or importer. The fineness mark is the number from the table above, often inside a shield or oval. The assay office mark shows where the piece was tested: an anchor for Birmingham, a leopard's head for London, a rose for Sheffield, a castle for Edinburgh. Birmingham's assay office sits in the Jewellery Quarter, the same district where Britannia Gold Exchange is based.

Look on the inside of ring bands, on clasps and the ends of bracelets, behind pendants and on the posts of earrings. The marks are tiny, so a 10x jeweller's loupe or the macro mode on a phone camera helps.

If there is no hallmark

A missing hallmark does not mean a piece is not gold. Under the Hallmarking Act 1973, gold items weighing less than 1 gram are exempt from mandatory hallmarking. Antique pieces, jewellery made abroad and items whose marks have simply worn away with decades of wear often carry nothing readable. Foreign pieces may instead bear stamps such as 10K, 14K, 18K, 21K or 22K.

This is the reason professional buyers test every item rather than trusting a stamp. For a closer look at the marks and what they mean, see our gold purity guide.

Plated and filled items

Gold-plated and gold-filled pieces have a layer of gold over a base metal and are worth little or nothing as scrap. Marks such as GP, HGE, RGP, "rolled gold" or GF are warnings. Two short guides explain how to tell solid gold from plated and how to spot fake or counterfeit gold. Colour is not a guide to purity either: yellow, rose and white gold are all alloys, and a pale 18ct piece can be worth far more than a bright yellow 9ct one.

Step 2: Weigh It Properly

Buyers work in grams, but the gold price is quoted in troy ounces and the jewellery trade still speaks in pennyweights, so it pays to know how the units relate.

The last row is the trap. A troy ounce is about 10% heavier than the ounce on a set of kitchen scales, so converting a quoted price per ounce without allowing for it overstates what a gram is worth. To get the price per gram of pure gold, divide the quoted price per troy ounce by 31.1035. A spot price of £3,004.22 per troy ounce, for example, works out at £96.59 per gram.

Weigh at home, but measure the right thing

A kitchen scale that reads to the nearest gram is too coarse for a 2 g earring. A small digital jewellery scale reading to 0.1 g or 0.01 g costs very little and is accurate enough for a sensible estimate. Weigh pieces of different carats separately and note each one.

The figure you want is the weight of the gold, not the weight of the item. Gemstones, pearls, glass, cord, steel clasp springs, solder and the movements inside watches all add weight without adding gold. A ring set with a large stone may weigh 8 g on your scale and contain considerably less gold than that. A professional buyer will weigh the item, test the metal and account for the non-gold components.

You do not need to sort or weigh anything before sending it to a buyer that tests each piece. Doing it yourself simply gives you a benchmark, so you can judge an offer against your own arithmetic.

Step 3: Understand the Gold Price, and Why Buyers Pay Below It

The price you see quoted on the news is the spot price: the wholesale price of pure, refined gold, traded in bulk between bullion dealers and banks. It moves continuously through the day, and on 26 October 2026 it stood at £3,004.22 per troy ounce, or £96.59 per gram of pure gold. For today's rate, use the live figure on our gold price page.

Spot is the starting point, not the amount a buyer pays you. Three separate values are easy to confuse:

• Spot price is the price of pure gold in bulk, as quoted.
• Melt value is your item's gold content priced at spot: weight × purity × spot per gram.
• Offer is what the buyer pays, which is a percentage of melt value.

Why every buyer pays less than melt value

Scrap and jewellery gold is not pure. Before it can be sold at spot it has to be tested, sorted, shipped under insurance, melted and refined back to bullion purity, and each of those steps has a cost. The buyer also carries the risk of price movement between buying your gold and selling the refined metal, plus the ordinary costs of staff, premises and security. The gap between melt value and the offer is how a legitimate buyer covers all of that and earns a living.

A buyer who pays exactly spot for scrap would be losing money, so be wary of any advert that implies it. The useful question is not whether a buyer pays below melt value, because all do, but how far below, and whether that is stated clearly. Our own approach is to check competitors' rates daily and to back it with a price match promise.

What moves the gold price

Gold tends to rise when investors want a safe place for money: during inflation, currency weakness, falling interest rates or geopolitical tension. Central bank buying adds steady demand. Because gold is priced in US dollars, the pound's exchange rate also changes what a UK seller receives per gram, even on a day when the dollar price barely moves. You cannot time these swings reliably, and our guide to whether now is a good time to sell explains why waiting for a perfect peak often costs more than it earns.

Pure gold value per gram by carat

Once you have the price per gram of pure gold, each carat's melt value per gram follows by multiplying by its purity. The table uses the 26 October figure of £96.59 per gram as an illustration; it is not a live price.

For live figures, see the 18ct gold price per gram today or our gold price page for every carat.

Worked Examples: From Drawer to Valuation

The table below applies the formula to four typical items, using the illustrative spot price of £96.59 per gram of pure gold. The figures are melt values, which is what the metal is worth before any buyer's margin.

The first three items together, the sort of collection that builds up in a jewellery box over decades, have a combined melt value of £1,097.51. The arithmetic also shows why the chain is worth three times the ring despite being the same carat: weight does the work.

Turning melt value into an expected offer

A buyer's offer is the melt value multiplied by their rate. If a buyer pays 90% of melt, that £1,097.51 becomes £987.76; at 85% it becomes £932.88. Those percentages are arithmetic illustrations only, not a statement of what any particular dealer pays. The point is that the rate is the one number you cannot see in your own calculation, so ask for it, or ask for a per-gram price for each carat and compare it across buyers on exactly the same basis.

A stone-set ring

The weight on the scale is not always the weight of gold. Take an 18ct ring that weighs 5.0 g in total and carries a one-carat diamond. Here the word "carat" means something entirely different from gold purity: for gemstones, one carat is a unit of weight equal to 0.2 g. The diamond therefore accounts for 0.2 g, leaving about 4.8 g of gold, and the melt value is 4.8 × 0.75 × £96.59 = £347.72. A valuer will test the metal and weigh the stone separately, so your own estimate should deduct the stone in the same way.

Two caveats apply. A good diamond or a fine gemstone can be worth more than its weight in gold terms and may deserve a separate valuation before you sell the ring for scrap. And these examples assume the gold is solid, which is why testing matters more than any amount of guessing.

Coins and Bullion: Sovereigns, Britannias, Krugerrands and Maple Leafs

Gold coins are the easiest items to value because their gold content is fixed and published. A coin's worth starts from its weight of pure gold priced at spot, and rises above that only when the coin is scarce, graded or in exceptional condition.

Two details trip people up. First, a Krugerrand is heavier than a Britannia of the same one-ounce gold content, because it is struck in 22ct gold and needs extra alloy to make up its weight; both contain one troy ounce of pure gold. Second, Britannias struck between 1987 and 2012 were 22ct, not the 24ct standard used since 2013, though they too contain one troy ounce of fine gold.

When a coin is worth more than its gold

Common-date sovereigns usually sell close to their gold content. Scarce dates, proof strikes, early issues and graded coins in high condition can command a premium over melt value, so check the date and mint mark before you assume scrap value. Do not clean or polish a coin: cleaning can permanently reduce its collector value, and a scratched or worn coin is still valued by weight. Keep any original capsules, cases or certificates, as they help establish authenticity.

Bars and bullion

Bullion bars are valued on weight and fineness, typically 999.9 or 999.0 for bars from recognised refiners, and an original assay certificate or sealed packaging makes verification faster. Unbranded or damaged bars are accepted too but are tested on arrival.

As a seller you should also understand the premium. Investors normally pay a dealer premium above spot to buy new bullion, and a buyer paying you for the same coin or bar typically starts from spot rather than from the premium you paid. We buy sovereigns, half sovereigns, Krugerrands, Britannias, Maple Leafs, Nuggets and Philharmonics in any condition, as well as gold bars and bullion.

What Raises or Lowers the Value of Your Gold

Most scrap gold is valued on its metal content alone, but a handful of item types sit outside that rule, some in your favour and some not.

Pieces that can be worth more than their gold

• Designer and signed jewellery. Work by a recognised maker can be worth more intact than melted. If a piece carries a famous name or a maker's mark you do not recognise, get a second opinion before selling it as scrap.
• Antique and period jewellery. Victorian, Edwardian and Art Deco pieces can carry a premium for craftsmanship that melt value ignores. Age alone does not guarantee one, but it is worth asking.
• Valuable stones. A good diamond or fine gemstone may be worth more than the setting. Have significant stones assessed separately.
• Luxury watches. A watch from a respected maker is usually worth far more as a working watch than as scrap. Scrap valuation is for solid gold cases and bracelets whose watch value is negligible; the movement adds no gold.

Items worth less than they look

• Gold-plated, gold-filled and costume jewellery. The gold layer is too thin to recover, so these pieces have no meaningful scrap value, and we do not buy them.
• Hollow pieces. Hollow chains and bangles look substantial but weigh little. Value follows weight, not size.
• Pieces with a lot of non-gold material. Stones, pearls, enamel and steel fittings are tested and deducted from the gold weight.
• Old repairs. Solder used in past repairs is often a lower purity than the piece itself. A good test accounts for it, and the effect is normally small.

Dental gold

Dental gold, meaning crowns, bridges and fillings, is accepted by gold buyers, but its gold content varies widely between restorations, so it has to be tested rather than assumed. Crowns fused with porcelain contain ceramic and other metals as well, which lowers the net gold weight. If you can separate non-gold material first, do, though a professional buyer will test either way.

Broken, tangled and mismatched pieces

Condition affects appearance, not the metal. A snapped chain, a single earring, a bent ring or a clump of tangled links is worth exactly what its gold content is worth. It is a common reason gold goes unsold at all: pieces written off as worthless because they are no longer wearable.

Unsure whether something is solid gold? We test every item for free, and anything that turns out not to be gold can be returned for a flat £15 charge. Our eligibility guide lists exactly what we accept.

Tax: What Happens When You Sell Gold in the UK

Most people selling a few unwanted pieces of jewellery will owe no tax, but gold is subject to Capital Gains Tax (CGT) rules, and a few details are worth knowing before you sell. This is general information, not tax advice; allowances and rules change, so confirm the current position on GOV.UK or with an accountant.

• CGT applies to the gain, not the sale price. The gain is what you received minus what you paid, or what the item was worth when you acquired it. It is only taxable above the annual exempt amount, which stood at £3,000 at the time of writing.
• Personal possessions sold for £6,000 or less are generally exempt. Most sales of ordinary jewellery fall comfortably within this limit.
• UK legal tender gold coins are exempt. Sovereigns, half sovereigns and Britannias are free of CGT. Foreign bullion coins such as Krugerrands and Maple Leafs, and gold bars, are generally not, so a gain on those could be chargeable above your allowance.
• Inherited gold starts from its value at death. The base cost is normally the value at the date of death, so only the increase since then counts. Selling soon after you inherit usually produces little or no gain.

Keep your paperwork: purchase receipts, past valuations, probate documents and the buyer's written valuation breakdown. If your sale is large or involves bars and foreign coins, speak to an accountant before you sell rather than afterwards.

How to Get the Best Price: Comparing Buyers and Avoiding Mistakes

Two sellers with the same gold can receive very different sums, and the difference is rarely luck. It comes from how many quotes they gathered, what they compared, and which route they chose.

Choosing where to sell

For ordinary scrap gold, a postal buyer combines the competitive pricing of an online business with a testing process you can follow. Our guide to how to sell gold by post walks through the whole process.

How to compare offers properly

1. Get two or three quotes on the same day. The gold price moves, so quotes taken a week apart are not comparable.
2. Compare the rate per gram for each carat, not only the headline total, and make sure each buyer is pricing the same items.
3. Ask whether a quote is fixed or subject to testing on arrival, and how long it stays valid.
4. Read the terms. Can you decline? Who pays for insured return postage? How quickly is payment made once you accept?
5. Check who you are dealing with. Look for a registered company, trade body membership and independent reviews. Britannia Gold Exchange Ltd, for instance, is registered in England and Wales (company number 17327003) and is a member of the National Association of Jewellers (NAJ-75025).
6. Look for a price match. If another UK gold buyer gives you a higher written quote for the same items, dated within the last 30 days, a price match promise means you can ask for it to be matched at today's gold price.
7. Keep a record. Photograph your items, note their weights and keep your postage receipt until payment is made.

Expect to be asked for photo ID. A legitimate buyer will do so as a matter of course, and its absence is more of a concern than its presence.

Common mistakes

• Accepting the first offer. Gold is a commodity, and offers differ.
• Testing items yourself with acid or a file. This scratches or damages the piece and can reduce its value; leave testing to a professional with XRF equipment.
• Throwing away broken or single items. Odd earrings, snapped chains and dental gold all hold value.
• Confusing spot price with an offer. Spot is the wholesale price of pure gold. No buyer pays it for scrap.
• Posting valuables without insurance. Never send gold by ordinary mail. Use a tracked, insured service such as Royal Mail Special Delivery.
• Waiting for a perfect price. Gold is volatile, and a good price today is worth more than a hoped-for better one.

How a Postal Valuation Works at Britannia Gold Exchange

We are a family-owned gold buyer based in Birmingham's Jewellery Quarter, and most of our customers sell by post from across the UK. The process is designed so that you can see where your gold is at every stage and walk away at the end if the offer is not right.

1. Request your free kit. Order online; kits ordered before 3pm are dispatched the same day. The kit, the postage and the insurance are free.
2. Receive it in one to two working days. It contains a tamper-proof bag, a prepaid Royal Mail Special Delivery envelope, instructions and a short valuation form.
3. Pack and post. Seal your items in the bag and drop the envelope at any Post Office. It is tracked and insured for the cover you choose when you order your kit: £750, £1,500 or £2,500.
4. We open, weigh and test. Packages are opened under CCTV. Each item is weighed on calibrated scales and tested for purity with non-destructive XRF analysis, and the assessment is recorded. Our page on how we test your gold explains each step.
5. You receive a same-day valuation. Your offer is based on the live gold price on the day of testing, with a breakdown of weight, purity and value and no hidden deductions. We pay 88% of the live gold price for the gold content.
6. Accept or decline. If you accept, payment goes to your bank account by transfer. If you decline, your items are returned free of charge and fully insured.

From requesting a kit to receiving payment, most customers complete the process in three to five days. If another UK gold buyer gives you a higher written quote for the same items, dated within the last 30 days, we'll match it at today's gold price. You can read what other customers say on Trustpilot.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much is my gold worth per gram in the UK?
It depends on the carat and the day's gold price. Multiply the price of pure gold per gram by the purity of your item: at £96.59 per gram, 9ct gold has a melt value of about £36 per gram, 18ct about £72 and 22ct about £88. A buyer's offer will be a percentage of those figures. Check the live rate on our gold price page.

How much is 9ct gold worth?
9ct gold is 37.5% pure. At £96.59 per gram of pure gold, a 10 g 9ct chain has a melt value of about £362 before any buyer's margin. Because 9ct is the most common gold in UK jewellery, it accounts for much of what people sell.

Is it worth selling broken gold jewellery?
Yes. Value comes from weight and purity, not condition. Snapped chains, odd earrings, bent rings and tangled pieces are all bought as scrap gold.

How much is a sovereign worth?
A full sovereign contains 7.322 g of pure gold, so at £96.59 per gram its melt value is about £707. Scarce dates and proof coins can be worth more than that.

Do I need a hallmark to sell gold?
No. Unhallmarked, antique and foreign gold is routinely bought and is tested to establish its purity, which is more reliable than a stamp alone.

Can I sell a gold watch?
Yes. A solid gold case or bracelet is valued by its gold weight. A watch from a respected maker may be worth far more as a working watch, so consider that before you sell it for scrap.

Do you buy dental gold?
Yes. Crowns, bridges, fillings and dental scrap are accepted and tested, as their gold content varies.

Is "cash for gold" a good deal?
The phrase simply describes any gold buyer. What matters is the rate per gram, the testing process, the terms on declining an offer and how the buyer handles your items. Compare these across two or three buyers rather than judging by the headline.

How do I know the weight and purity are measured correctly?
Use a buyer that weighs on calibrated scales, tests with XRF and gives you a written breakdown. Compare it with the weights you recorded yourself, and remember that you can decline.

Is selling gold by post safe?
Yes, when you use a tracked and insured service. Our postal kits use Royal Mail Special Delivery, insured for £750, £1,500 or £2,500, whichever you choose when you order.

Do I pay tax when I sell gold?
Often not. Personal possessions sold for £6,000 or less are generally exempt from Capital Gains Tax, and UK legal tender coins such as sovereigns and Britannias are exempt. Check the position for bars, foreign coins and larger sales with an accountant or GOV.UK.

How quickly will I be paid?
Payment is made by bank transfer once you accept your offer, and most customers finish the whole process in three to five days from requesting the kit.

What if I change my mind?
You are under no obligation. If you decline your valuation, we return your items free of charge and fully insured.

Find Out What Your Gold Is Worth

You now have everything needed to estimate the value of your gold before you speak to a buyer: the purity from the hallmark, the weight in grams, the live price of pure gold and the formula that joins them. The one number you cannot calculate for yourself is the buyer's rate, which is why a tested, written valuation from a buyer you can trust is worth more than any online estimate.

If you would like to see what your jewellery, scrap gold, coins or bullion are worth today, request your free insured postal gold kit. There is no obligation to sell, our price match promise applies, and if you decline the offer your items come back to you free of charge. You can also use the calculator on our gold price page for a quick estimate, or read the FAQ for more on how the service works.

The prices and melt values in this guide are illustrations based on a gold price of £96.59 per gram, taken on 26 October 2026. Gold prices change constantly, so check the current rate before you make decisions. This article is general information, not financial or tax advice.