Dental Gold Calculator — Value Your Old Crowns & Bridges
Weigh without ceramic or plastic.
As a fraction: 750 = 0.75 · 900 = 0.9 · 585 = 0.585
Difference between the material value and the actual buy-back price (refining, assay & dealer margin).
366.59 GBP
5.00 g × 75.0 % Gold = 3.750 g fine gold · 97.76 GBP/g
approx. 311.60 GBP
Material value less a 15 % buy-back discount. A rough guideline — real offers vary by buyer.
Important with white dental gold: White dental alloys often contain platinum and palladium rather than gold. Their value is not included here. Only a refinery assay can determine the exact metal content.
Calculated from the current gold price. The material value shown refers to the gold content only.
Related Calculators
What Is Dental Gold?
Dental gold refers to the precious metal alloys used in dentistry for crowns, bridges, inlays and partial dentures. Pure gold would be too soft to withstand chewing forces — so dental gold is always an alloy in which gold is combined with other metals such as platinum, palladium, silver, copper and zinc. These additions make the restoration hard, corrosion-resistant and biocompatible. More than 200 different dental alloys exist worldwide, which is why a blanket value estimate without an assay is impossible.
What matters for the value is which of the four basic types your restoration belongs to — from high-gold (valuable) to precious-metal-free (almost worthless). The next section breaks this down in detail.
Good to know: Even old restorations that have sat in a drawer for decades do not lose their material value — on the contrary, with the higher gold price they are often worth more today than when they were fitted.
Alloys & Fineness
The fineness indicates how much of the alloy is actually gold — expressed in thousandths (750 = 75% gold) or in carats. With dental gold this is usually not readable for a layperson, because restorations carry no hallmark (fineness stamp). Four basic types are distinguished:
| Type | Gold content | Characteristics |
|---|---|---|
| High-gold | approx. 75–90% | Rich yellow, highest material value — classic older crowns & bridges |
| Reduced-gold | approx. 20–75% | Paler yellow, medium value, more palladium/silver |
| Palladium-based (white) | often < 60% | Silvery-white — value lies mainly in platinum & palladium |
| Base metal (non-precious) | 0% | Cobalt-chrome-molybdenum/steel — almost worthless, typical of dentures & clasps |
Averaged across all dental gold alloys, the gold content is around 72%, plus on average roughly 11% silver, 6% platinum and 5% palladium — though the real range runs from about 32% to 89% gold. If you do not know the fineness, start with a conservative value (e.g. 585) to avoid inflated expectations. The exact composition is determined by the buyer through an assay (see the section on how the sale works).
Platinum & Palladium: The Hidden Value
Probably the most expensive mistake when selling dental gold: looking only at the gold. Many alloys — especially white ones — contain significant amounts of platinum and palladium, and at times these metals are as expensive as, or even more expensive than, gold. A "white" restoration that a layperson assumes is worthless can therefore hold a considerable precious metal value.
The catch: only reputable refineries pay for the platinum, palladium and silver too. Many local buyers and jewellers pay for the gold content only and keep the rest as additional margin. That is exactly why comparison pays off — and why our calculator deliberately shows the pure gold value as a floor.
Calculating Weight & Value
The material value of dental gold follows a simple formula:
Weight (g) × gold content × current gold price per gram = gold value
Example (with the current gold price): A gold crown weighs 4 grams and is made of 750 gold (75%). At the current gold price of 97.76 £/g this gives: 4 g × 0.75 × 97.76 £/g = 293.27 £ of pure gold value.
The buy-back price sits below this, because buyers factor in the cost of assaying, refining (separating the metals) and their margin. Discounts of around 8–15% are considered fair — a payout of 85–92% of the material value is realistic. The calculator above shows both figures and helps you put offers in context.
How Much Does Dental Work Weigh?
The exact amount only emerges when you weigh it — as a rough guide:
- ◆Gold crown: typically 1–5 g (full crowns up to ~10 g)
- ◆Inlay/onlay: from about 0.5 g up to several grams
- ◆Bridge: several crown units, correspondingly heavier
A Fair Buy-Back Price & Discounts
No buyer pays the full material value — they have to cover assaying, refining (the chemical-thermal separation of the metals) and their margin. The key question is how large that discount is. As a guide:
Fair: 85–92% payout
A discount of 8–15% on the pure material value is customary and reputable.
Unfair: well below 80%
Anyone offering much less, or "forgetting" platinum/palladium, is profiting from the lack of comparison.
Reputable refineries often settle without separate assay fees and pay out even for the smallest amounts of precious metal. The estimated buy-back price in the calculator above applies an adjustable discount — set it to the figure a provider quotes you, and you will see instantly whether the offer is fair.
Where to Sell? The Three Channels
| Channel | Price | Advantage | Disadvantage |
|---|---|---|---|
| Refinery | usually best | Melts/refines itself, pays for Pt/Pd/silver too, precise assay | Shipping & waiting time |
| Local buyer | medium | Instant cash, personal contact | Often pays for gold only, higher margin |
| Online buyer | often high | Transparent daily rates, easy to compare | Postage risk, no instant cash |
Tip: For white or mixed dental gold a refinery is almost always the best choice — only a refinery reliably pays for the valuable secondary metals platinum and palladium.
How the Sale Works
-
1
Clean roughly & weigh
Remove tooth remnants and loose ceramic, then weigh on a digital scale (0.1 g). The refinery will remove any residues professionally later anyway.
-
2
Estimate the material value
Use the calculator above to form an idea of the value from weight and estimated fineness.
-
3
Get at least 3 offers
Prices vary considerably — compare a refinery, a local buyer and an online provider.
-
4
Post insured or be present
When posting: photograph, weigh and insure adequately (Royal Mail Special Delivery covers precious metals up to set limits). In person: stay during the valuation and, if possible, bring a trusted companion.
-
5
Professional assay
X-ray fluorescence analysis (XRF, non-destructive) or a fire assay (melting into a homogeneous button) determines the exact content of all precious metals.
-
6
Payout at the daily rate
The payout is based on the current precious metal price. Keep the receipt showing weight, fineness and rate.
Sell Safely: Avoiding Scams
Highest alert level: doorstep and "hotel gold-buying" events. Time pressure, aggressive tactics and the seemingly harmless question about "any other valuables" are typical. Never let unknown buyers into your home.
Common Tricks
- ◆Gross/net trick: deliberately confusing the total weight (including tooth/ceramic) with the pure precious metal weight.
- ◆"Overlooking" secondary metals: platinum, palladium and silver are not paid for, even though they are present in the dental gold.
- ◆Opaque valuation: no verifiable rate, no documented fineness, pressure to sell on the spot.
Checklist for a Safe Sale
- ◆Remove foreign parts roughly and weigh it yourself on a digital scale.
- ◆Check the current gold price and estimate the material value yourself.
- ◆Get and compare at least three offers.
- ◆Insist on daily, transparently published buy-back prices.
- ◆Be present during the valuation; insure and photograph posted parcels beforehand.
Tax & Legal Basics
In the UK, selling private dental gold falls under Capital Gains Tax (CGT) rules, not income tax. In practice a sale is only taxable if your total gains for the tax year exceed the annual CGT allowance (£3,000 for 2024/25 onwards) — and the "gain" is the difference between what you receive and what the gold originally cost you, which for old or inherited restorations is usually negligible or unknowable. Genuine UK legal tender bullion coins such as gold Sovereigns and Britannias are entirely exempt from CGT, though this exemption applies to the coins themselves rather than to scrap dental gold.
VAT: selling your own gold as a private individual does not make you liable for VAT, and investment gold is VAT-exempt in the UK in any case. Your property: once a restoration has been extracted it belongs to you, not the dental practice — the practice must return it and may only keep it with your explicit consent (for example, for a charitable dental-gold donation). Keep the buy-back receipt in case you ever need to evidence the origin or value.
This is not tax advice. The information above is a general orientation as of 2026, based on UK rules, and does not replace professional advice. Tax thresholds and reliefs change over time — check the current HMRC guidance or consult a qualified tax adviser for your situation.
Sustainability & Interesting Facts
Dental gold is "green" gold: recycled gold saves dramatically on energy, water and chemicals compared with newly mined gold. And practically nothing is lost — the recovery rate is close to 100%. Your old gold tooth therefore rejoins the global gold cycle almost in full.
~28%
of the global gold supply comes from recycling — scrap gold makes up around 90% of that.
~100%
recovery rate for dental gold — every gram of precious metal is reclaimed.
~36 mg
of gold sit in a single smartphone — one tonne of old phones holds more gold than a tonne of ore.
Urban mining: dental gold, old jewellery and electronics together have long been one of the world's most important gold sources. Historically, dental gold was even one of the main sources of gold recycling; today it plays a smaller but still valued role — including for charitable dental-gold donations.