Old jewelry is real gold when it carries a karat or fineness stamp such as 10K, 14K, 18K, 585 or 750, and nothing next to that stamp says plated or filled. Color tells you almost nothing: brass, gold plate and solid 14K look the same in a drawer and in a photo. Most inherited jewelry boxes hold a mix, usually a few solid gold pieces (wedding bands, class rings, chains) among a larger pile of costume and plated jewelry that is worth a few dollars a piece.
The good news is that gold is easy to value once you know it is gold. A solid piece is worth at least its melt value, which you can work out with a kitchen scale and the day's gold price. Signed pieces from fine houses and collectible costume makers can be worth more than their metal, and those are the ones worth a closer look.
Where to look for the stamp
Stamps are small and usually hidden. Check these spots with a magnifying glass or your phone camera zoomed in, in daylight and without flash:
- Rings: the inside of the shank, often opposite the stone.
- Chains and necklaces: the clasp, the tongue of the clasp, or a small tag near it.
- Bracelets: the clasp or the inside of the band.
- Earrings: the post or the back of the clip.
- Brooches: the back, near the pin or the catch.
- Pendants: the bail (the loop the chain passes through).
A worn stamp is common on rings that were worn daily for decades. A missing stamp does not mean a piece is fake, but it does mean nobody can call it gold from a photo.
What the gold stamps mean
Karat stamps (mostly American and British)
Karat is parts of gold out of 24. The higher the number, the more gold.
- 10K: 41.7 percent gold, the legal minimum to be called gold in the US.
- 14K: 58.3 percent gold, the most common American stamp.
- 18K: 75 percent gold, common on European and finer pieces.
- 22K: 91.6 percent gold, common on South Asian and Middle Eastern jewelry.
- KP after a number (14KP) means karat plumb, an older American mark saying the alloy is at least the stated karat.
Fineness numbers (European and modern)
These give the gold content in parts per thousand:
| Stamp | Equivalent | Gold content |
|---|---|---|
| 333 | 8K | 33.3 percent |
| 375 | 9K | 37.5 percent |
| 417 | 10K | 41.7 percent |
| 585 | 14K | 58.5 percent |
| 750 | 18K | 75 percent |
| 916 | 22K | 91.6 percent |
| 999 | 24K | 99.9 percent |
British pieces may also show a crown with 375, 585 or 750, a town mark (a leopard's head for London, an anchor for Birmingham) and a date letter that dates the piece to a year.
Platinum and silver stamps
Platinum reads PLAT, PT950, PT900 or 950. It is denser and heavier than gold and was popular for Art Deco diamond rings. Silver reads 925 or STERLING; if a gold-colored piece is stamped 925, it is gold over silver, called vermeil. For more on silver marks, see our guide to sterling silver versus silver plate.
The plating marks that fool people
This is where most disappointments come from. Many pieces carry a number that looks like a karat stamp, followed by letters that mean the gold is only a thin layer:
- GP or GE: gold plated or gold electroplate. A microscopic layer over brass or another base metal.
- HGE or HGP: heavy gold electroplate. Still plated, just a thicker layer.
- RGP: rolled gold plate. A thin sheet of gold bonded to base metal.
- GF or 1/20 12K GF: gold filled. A thicker bonded layer, here one twentieth of the weight in 12K gold. Much better made than plate, but still mostly base metal.
- 18KGP or 14KGP: plated, despite the 18K in the stamp.
The classic trap is "14K HGE". The 14K is real in the sense that the plating layer is 14K gold, but the piece itself is plated base metal and has almost no scrap value. Gold-filled watch bands, lockets and cufflinks from the 1940s to 1970s are very common and usually sell for $5-40 depending on design.
Wear is a helpful clue. Plated pieces often show a different color (pink, gray or brassy) at the edges and high points where the layer has rubbed away. Solid gold wears smooth but stays the same color all the way through.
What a photo cannot tell you
A good photo can show stamps, signatures, construction, era and style. It cannot settle:
- Whether an unstamped piece is solid gold or plated. That takes an acid test or an XRF reading.
- What a stone is. A clear stone may be diamond, moissanite, cubic zirconia, white sapphire or glass. A red stone may be ruby, garnet, spinel or glass.
- Whether a diamond is natural or lab-grown, or whether a gemstone is treated.
- Whether pearls are natural, cultured or imitation.
- The exact weight, which matters for melt value.
The photo that settles most cases is a sharp close-up of the stamp, taken in daylight with a coin beside it for scale. For stones, a side view of the setting helps: closed, foil-backed settings usually point to rhinestones and costume jewelry.
How to work out melt value
Solid gold has a floor value: its metal content at the current spot price. The formula is simple:
weight in grams x purity x spot price per gram of pure gold
A worked example
Say you have a plain 14K wedding band that weighs 5 grams on a kitchen scale. Assume gold is about $4,000 per troy ounce, which is roughly $129 per gram (gold moves daily, so check the current price before you do the math).
- 5 g x 0.583 = 2.9 g of pure gold
- 2.9 g x $129 = about $375 in melt value
Scrap buyers and refiners pay roughly 70-90 percent of melt, so expect an offer of about $260-340 for that ring. A pawn shop will often offer less. A heavier piece scales the same way: a 20 gram 14K chain holds about 11.7 grams of pure gold.
Remove stones before weighing if you can, or subtract a rough allowance, since they add weight but no gold value.
Typical values for common pieces
| Piece | Approximate value |
|---|---|
| Unsigned costume brooch, earrings or necklace | $5-50, often sold in lots |
| Gold-filled or plated chain, locket or cufflinks | $5-40 |
| Signed Trifari, Coro, Monet or Napier | $15-100 |
| Miriam Haskell, Eisenberg, Trifari jelly belly | $100-800 |
| Plain 10K or 14K class ring or wedding band | Mostly melt, often $100-500 |
| Cultured Akoya pearl strand | $100-500 |
| Art Deco platinum and diamond ring | $500-5,000 depending on stones |
| Cartier Love bracelet in 18K | $4,500-7,000 |
Costume jewelry, signed makers and fine houses
Costume jewelry
Costume jewelry is made from base metals, glass and rhinestones. Most of it sells for a few dollars a piece. The exceptions are signed pieces from makers that collectors follow:
- Trifari: a crown over the T, with a copyright symbol on pieces from about 1955 onward.
- Monet: clean, polished gold-tone designs, usually signed on the back or clasp.
- Napier: chunky gold-tone and silver-tone pieces, signed in block letters.
- Coro, Weiss, Sarah Coventry and Kenneth Jay Lane (KJL): common and modest.
- Miriam Haskell and Eisenberg: the higher end of costume, with hand-wired beads and heavy settings.
Fine houses
Pieces from Tiffany, Cartier, Van Cleef and Arpels, Bulgari, David Yurman and Georg Jensen can sell well above their metal value. They are also the most copied names in jewelry. A real Cartier piece usually carries a serial number alongside the signature and a fineness mark; a Tiffany piece reads "T & CO." or "TIFFANY & CO." with 925 or AU750. Fake signatures are common, so a signature is a reason to look closer, not proof.
Who settles it for real
If your piece has a gold stamp and a plausible weight, or a fine house signature, the next step is a hands-on check:
- A jeweler can run an acid test or an XRF test in minutes and tell you the actual gold content. Many will do it while you wait.
- A gemologist, ideally GIA trained, can identify stones and tell natural from lab-grown or treated.
- For a high-value piece, a written appraisal from an accredited appraiser is worth the fee before you sell or insure it.
Sell gold by weight to a buyer who quotes a price per gram in front of you, and get more than one quote. For signed fine pieces, an auction house or a specialist dealer usually pays more than a scrap buyer. If the piece came with a watch or other family valuables, our guide to inherited watches covers the same steps for timepieces.