You have a 14K chain, a broken bracelet, or a drawer of odd earrings, and you want a number before anyone at a counter gives you one. The question of how much is 14k gold worth per gram has a genuinely simple answer once you know two things: how pure 14K actually is, and today’s gold spot price. The catch is that the melt number you calculate is not the number a dealer hands you, and knowing the gap is what keeps you from getting shortchanged.
To find how much 14k gold is worth per gram, multiply the weight in grams by 0.585 (14K is 58.5 percent pure gold) by the current gold spot price per gram. So the melt value of one gram of 14K is roughly 0.585 times the per-gram spot price. That figure is the raw metal value only, before a buyer’s margin, and it is not what you will be paid.
Here is the exact formula, a worked example, and an honest explanation of why buyers pay less than melt.
What 14K actually means
Karat measures gold purity in twenty-fourths. Pure gold is 24K, so 14K is 14 parts gold out of 24. By exact arithmetic that is 58.33 percent, and the trade rounds it to the 585 stamp, which guarantees a minimum of 58.5 percent gold (the figure the melt math uses). The rest is a mix of other metals such as copper, silver, zinc, and nickel that make the alloy harder and set its color. You will see the purity marked two ways: 14K or the parts-per-thousand stamp 585. Under the FTC Jewelry Guides, an item sold as 14K in the United States must actually meet that fineness, so the stamp is a regulated claim, not decoration. Before trusting any stamp, though, confirm the piece really is gold and not plated, using our guide on how to tell if gold is real. A 585 stamp on plated base metal is worth its scrap weight in base metal, not gold, which is exactly the trap covered in gold filled vs gold plated vs solid gold.
How much is 14k gold worth per gram: the formula
Melt value is what the pure gold content is worth at the current market price. The formula:
Melt value = weight in grams x 0.585 x gold spot price per gram
You need three inputs:
- Weight in grams. Use a small digital scale that reads to a tenth of a gram. Weigh only the gold: remove or exclude gemstones, and set aside clasps or findings if they are a different or unmarked metal.
- Purity factor. For 14K that is 0.585. (For reference, 10K is 0.417, 18K is 0.750, 24K is 1.0.)
- Gold spot price per gram. Gold is quoted per troy ounce, and one troy ounce is about 31.1 grams, so the per-gram price is the per-ounce price divided by 31.1. Always pull a live figure from a current gold-price source on the day you calculate, because the spot price moves every trading day.
A worked example
Say you have a 14K chain that weighs 10 grams after you have excluded the stone in its pendant.
Using a clearly illustrative spot price of 80 dollars per gram (this is a placeholder for the math, not a current quote, so replace it with today’s live figure):
- 10 grams x 0.585 = 5.85 grams of pure gold
- 5.85 x 80 dollars = 468 dollars melt value
That 468 dollars is the raw metal value of the gold content at the illustrative price. Change the spot price and the answer changes proportionally, which is the whole point of using the formula instead of memorizing a number. Run it again with the real spot price the day you sell.
One more adjustment matters: weigh gemstones out. If that pendant holds a stone, its weight is not gold, and including it inflates your estimate. Diamond and colored-stone value is a separate question entirely, handled the way our guide on what makes jewelry worth more describes, not by the gold formula.
Why a buyer pays less than melt
Here is the part that catches sellers off guard. The melt value is the ceiling, not the offer. A gold buyer or refiner is running a business, and several real costs sit between your calculation and their check:
- Refining. Scrap gold has to be melted, assayed, and separated from its alloy metals, which costs money and takes time.
- Margin. The buyer needs a profit and a cushion against the spot price falling before they can resell.
- Overhead. Storefront, insurance, and staff all come out of the spread.
Because of that, gold buyers commonly pay a percentage below melt. How far below varies widely by the buyer type and the amount you are selling, with refiners and bulk buyers typically paying closer to melt than a walk-in pawn or retail counter; see how much pawn shops pay for gold for what that gap looks like at a pawn counter specifically. There is no single fixed percentage, so the practical move is to calculate your melt value first, then compare written offers against it and against each other. A buyer who will not show their math relative to the current spot price is one to walk away from.
Melt, resale, and retail are three different numbers
The single most useful habit when valuing gold is to name which number you mean, because people quote one and expect another and end up disappointed.
- Melt value is the metal content at spot, the formula above. It ignores craftsmanship entirely. This is roughly what a scrap buyer works from.
- Resale value is what the piece can fetch as finished jewelry on the secondhand market. For a plain generic chain, resale is close to melt. For a signed designer piece, an antique, or something with fine stones, resale can sit well above melt because the design and maker carry value that scrap ignores.
- Retail or insurance replacement value is what it costs to buy the piece new at a store, which includes the full retail markup and is always the highest of the three. This is the number that belongs on an insurance policy, not the number you will be paid when selling.
Selling a distinctive or antique piece for melt is the classic costly mistake, because you throw away the resale premium. Before you scrap anything, it is worth checking whether the piece is worth more intact. Our guide to what your jewelry is worth walks through choosing the right number for your situation.
Run the numbers, then confirm
Weigh the gold, apply the 58.5 percent factor, multiply by today’s live spot price per gram, and you have a defensible melt estimate to check offers against. Do it before you visit any counter, keep gemstones out of the weight, and remember that a genuinely special piece may be worth more sold whole than melted.
If you want a fast first read on a piece before you weigh and calculate, scan it with GemPeek. The app returns a likely identification of type, materials, and marks, plus condition notes and an estimated value range, so you can tell at a glance whether you are probably dealing with a scrap-value chain or something worth appraising. Treat that as an informed first answer, and confirm purity with an acid or electronic test and value with a professional before you sell anything that might be worth more than its melt.