Gold and silver value estimator
Photograph the item and its purity stamp, and type the weight if you have a scale. The estimator identifies the metal and purity, works out a melt-value range, and tells you when an item is worth more than its metal.
Example estimate
Polaroid SX-70 Land Camera
$190
Usually sells for $120 – $320
Your result appears here.
How to photograph it
Good photos are the biggest single improvement to an estimate. These are the shots that matter most.
- Take a sharp close-up of the purity stamp, such as 14K, 585, 925 or 999.
- Photograph the whole piece on a plain background.
- Weigh it in grams on a kitchen or jewelry scale and type the weight.
- Mention any stones, clasps or parts that are not metal.
What decides the price
- Purity
- 10K gold is 41.7% gold, 14K is 58.5%, 18K is 75%. Sterling silver is 92.5% silver and US coin silver 90%.
- Weight
- Metal value is weight times purity times the day's spot price, so an accurate weight matters most.
- Plated or filled
- Marks like GP, GF, HGE or EP mean plated or filled. These have little metal value.
- More than metal
- Signed designer pieces, rare coins and antique jewelry can sell well above melt value to collectors.
What this market actually looks like
Precious metals are the one category here with a published, continuously updated price, and that changes how valuation works. Spot price times weight times purity gives a melt value that any dealer in the world can calculate in seconds, and almost everything trades in a narrow band around it. There is very little room for opinion.
The band around melt is where the detail lives. Recognised bullion coins and bars from major mints trade at a small premium over melt because they are easy to verify and resell. Scrap jewellery and unmarked items trade below melt, because the buyer carries the cost and risk of refining. The spread between those two positions is the practical question for most sellers.
A separate and much smaller market exists for coins whose collector value exceeds their metal. Early dates, low mintages and high grades can be worth multiples of melt, and melting them destroys that permanently. This is the one place where a hasty sale to a scrap buyer causes real loss, and it is why sorting matters before weighing.
Purity is the other thing that moves the number, and it is frequently misread. Gold is sold in several standards and the difference between them is large: a given weight of nine-carat gold contains well under half the gold of the same weight at twenty-two carat. Sterling silver is 92.5% silver, while silver plate contains a negligible amount and has no melt value worth collecting, which is the most common disappointment in this category.
How condition is judged here
- Purity marks decide everything
- Look for 375, 585, 750, 916 or 999 on gold and 925 or 958 on silver. Those numbers are parts per thousand and they scale the value directly.
- Weigh on a proper scale
- Precious metals are priced per gram or per troy ounce, and a troy ounce is heavier than the ordinary one. Kitchen scales are not accurate enough for a sale of any size.
- Bullion versus scrap
- A recognised coin or stamped bar from a known mint sells at a premium because its content is certain. The same metal as a broken chain sells at a discount for exactly the inverse reason.
- Plate has no melt value
- EPNS, silver plate and gold-filled items carry a microscopic amount of precious metal over a base core. They are sold for their design, if at all, not for their content.
What costs people money
Most of the value lost in this category is lost before the item is listed, by the owner, with good intentions. These are the four that come up most often.
- Melting collectable coins
- Scrap buyers weigh rather than identify. Any coin that might be a key date should be checked before it goes into the pile.
- Selling on the first quote
- Dealer margins on scrap vary a great deal. Three quotes on the same day for the same metal is the minimum sensible effort.
- Trusting a magnet test alone
- Gold and silver are not magnetic, but neither are several base metals used in fakes. A magnet rules things out; it does not confirm anything.
- Reading the spot price as the offer
- Spot is the wholesale price for large refined quantities. Nobody pays spot for a bag of jewellery, and expecting it wastes everybody's time.
When to bring in a professional
Have a coin dealer look through anything that contains coins before a refiner does, because that is the only irreversible decision in this category. For bars and recognised bullion coins, an assay or a verified dealer purchase protects against the counterfeits that circulate in the larger sizes. For plain scrap, no professional opinion is needed at all: weigh it, check the marks, and get competing quotes on a day when the spot price is where you want it.
Common questions
How much will a buyer pay compared with melt value?
Scrap buyers usually pay less than full melt value to cover their costs. Comparing several offers makes a real difference.
How do I tell if gold is real without a stamp?
A photo cannot tell. A jeweler's acid or electronic test takes minutes. A magnet only rules out some fakes.
Does the estimate use today's gold price?
The AI does not have a live price feed. It gives a range based on typical recent prices, so check today's spot price before you sell.