Current Iridium Price and Iridium Rate with Chart
Iridium is the most corrosion-resistant metal known and one of the rarest elements in the Earth's crust. Annual production is measured in single-digit tonnes, almost all of it a by-product of South African platinum mining. It is used in spark plug electrodes, crucibles for growing sapphire and other crystals, and as the electrode catalyst in PEM electrolysers for hydrogen — the application that has driven most of the recent price moves. Iridium is not exchange-traded and has no fixing; the quotation shown here is a dealer reference price updated twice a day. As with ruthenium, this page therefore leaves out seasonality, the performance calendar and the Fear & Greed index. The chart starts in 2023, the point from which the series stands up to a comparison with the published Johnson Matthey base prices.
Here you see the current Iridium price per troy ounce in your selected currency, including daily change in percent and absolute.
Below you find the current exchange rate and the price in the second currency. At the bottom are the prices per gram, troy ounce and kilogram.
Source: Spot
Every point on this curve is a recorded Iridium quote from the window you have chosen. Run the pointer along the line and the tooltip reveals the exact level reached on that particular trading day.
The buttons above switch the window, running from Today through to Max. Drag across a stretch of the curve to magnify it. Beneath the chart, three summary cards report the peak, the trough and the net move.
Tip: Choose Today and the series resolves down to a single reading per minute.
(06/11/26)
(08/10/26)
(06/11/26)
(09/10/26)
Name a date and the lookup returns what Iridium was worth on it: the opening and closing levels, the extremes reached in between, and the equivalent figures per gram and per kilogram.
Tip: Pick your date. Should London have been shut that day, the lookup falls back to the closest session it holds.
| 06/11/2026 | GBP | USD |
|---|---|---|
| Open | – | – |
| High | – | – |
| Low | – | – |
| Close | 7,341.74 £ | 9,800.00 $ |
Source: Spot
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Enjoying what you see and read?
We pour our heart into keeping preciousmetalprices.com fast, clean and free — no paywalls, no clutter, just reliable facts and live prices. If it helps you, the nicest way to say thank you is to pass it on. Every share helps a fellow investor discover us and keeps the project going. 💛
Here you can see the current iridium price converted to different weight units: gram, troy ounce (31.1 g) and kilogram.
The second row shows the price in the other currency for comparison.
Tip: A troy ounce is the international trading unit for precious metals and equals 31.1035 grams.
1 Troy Ounce = 31.1035 Grams
This table shows the current price per gram for various Iridium alloys. The fineness indicates how much pure Iridium is contained in 1000 parts.
Example: : 750/1000 means 75% pure Iridium (for gold this equals 18 carat). The price per gram is calculated according to the fineness.
| Fineness | Carat | Price / Gram |
|---|---|---|
| 999/1000 | Fine Iridium | 235.72 £ |
| 999.5/1000 | Fine Iridium | 235.96 £ |
The performance table shows how the Iridium price has developed over various time periods: from today to 5 years.
You can see the absolute change in both currencies as well as the percentage change. Green values indicate gain, red values indicate loss.
Tip: Compare the EUR and USD performance to identify the impact of the exchange rate.
| Period | GBP | % GBP | USD | % USD |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Today | +17.53 £ | +0.20 % | +0.00 $ | +0.00 % |
| 7 Days | +17.53 £ | +0.20 % | +0.00 $ | +0.00 % |
| 30 Days | +1,339.22 £ | +17.95 % | +1,475.00 $ | +17.72 % |
| since Jan 1 | +4,647.60 £ | +111.95 % | +5,167.13 $ | +111.53 % |
| 1 Year | +4,735.74 £ | +116.55 % | +5,265.50 $ | +116.12 % |
Here you can find a quick overview of the current prices of the other precious metals. The percentage shows the daily change.
Tip: Click on a metal to go directly to its detail page.
What Is the Iridium Price?
The iridium price states what one troy ounce (31.1035 grams) of refined iridium costs. As with rhodium and ruthenium there is no exchange, no fixing and no futures contract. One sentence from the Johnson Matthey report of May 2026 explains most of this page: "The iridium market is by far the smallest and least liquid of the PGMs, so even relatively modest additional buying activity can cause significant volatility." The size behind it is 7.1 tonnes in 2025 — the entire world production for a year.
| Iridium, 23 Oct 2026 | Purchase | Sale, unfabricated | Sale, fabricated |
|---|---|---|---|
| per kilogram | 204,700 EUR | 292,400 EUR | 309,250 EUR |
Umicore, 23 October 2026. Same day and category, per gram: iridium 309.25 EUR, rhodium 284.95, gold 128.25, ruthenium 61.35, platinum 47.80.
Iridium was therefore the most expensive platinum group metal on that day. Most readers expect the opposite ranking, and the reversal is recent: in the annual average, iridium overtook rhodium for the first time in 2024.
Why this page gives no price in pounds: a British buyer carries one currency layer more than a euro-area buyer — quotation in US dollars per troy ounce, invoice in euros per kilogram, payment in sterling, each leg at its own rate. We hold no exchange rate with a stated date and source, so every figure stays in the currency it was published in.
How the Iridium Price Is Formed Without an Exchange
For gold the reference price comes out of an electronic auction in London, administered by ICE Benchmark Administration under Financial Conduct Authority supervision. For iridium none of that exists — no fixing, no spot market, no exchange stocks, no lease rates, no volume statistics at all. The Guangzhou Futures Exchange has listed PGM futures since the end of November 2025, but for platinum and palladium only.
Who Quotes Iridium — and What Those Quotations Are
The best known quotation is the Johnson Matthey Base Price, set by desks in the USA, Hong Kong and the UK for metal in sponge form at a minimum purity of 99.9%. The decisive sentence sits in its disclaimer: "In publishing the Prices, Johnson Matthey Plc does not engage or intend to engage in the administration of a benchmark."
So the world’s best known iridium price is expressly not a benchmark; it is one dealer’s offer. The contrast is exact: the LBMA Gold Price is a regulated benchmark under United Kingdom law. Umicore says the same of its own figures: "of pure statistical nature and must be looked at as indications only".
The Spread Between Buying and Selling: 30.0%, Measured
| Metal | Median | Min | Max | Days with a change |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Iridium | 30.0% | 30.0% | 30.0% | 74% |
| Ruthenium | 30.0% | 29.9% | 30.0% | 70% |
| Rhodium | 15.0% | 15.0% | 15.0% | 84% |
| Palladium | 8.0% | 7.9% | 8.1% | 96% |
| Platinum | 7.0% | 6.9% | 7.1% | 97% |
Own measurement from the published Umicore series, 142 quotation days from 1 April to 23 October 2026, per metal and price category, purchase against sale of unfabricated metal.
What the constancy proves: over 142 days the purchase price sat 30.0% below the sales price — not "around 30%", but 30.0% to the decimal place every day. A genuine bid/ask spread narrows as a market becomes more liquid and widens in a panic. A figure that never moves is a fixed dealer markup, not a market measurement. At 7.0% for platinum the markup is less than a quarter of the iridium figure.
A second measured cost is specific to this metal: fabricated metal cost a median 5.8% more than unfabricated, the highest of the five — not a marketing margin but metallurgy, since iridium melts at 2,446 °C and is brittle. The quotation is also often motionless: it did not move at all on 26% of days, and the USGS once listed iridium at exactly 420.00 USD per ounce on every day of June and July 2009.
Iridium Price History and Performance
The cleanest long series is the US Geological Survey reproduction of the Engelhard annual averages for unfabricated metal.
| Annual average, USD/oz | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 (est.) |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Iridium | 5,158.40 | 4,581.93 | 4,672.78 | 4,810.40 | 4,400 |
| Rhodium | 20,254.10 | 15,585.00 | 6,660.58 | 4,660.44 | 5,800 |
USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026; Engelhard annual averages via S&P Global Platts Metals Week.
In 2024 iridium’s annual average exceeded rhodium’s for the first time on this record. For 2025 the USGS puts the change at minus 9%, affected by "the waning of investor enthusiasm in the hydrogen power market".
Two Figures, Both Correct
The USGS records a 2025 annual average 9% below 2024, while Johnson Matthey reports an all-time high of 8,000 USD in the first quarter of 2026. An average can fall while the price rises into the year end.
The ledger does not explain the price: Johnson Matthey’s summary is that "on a pure supply-demand basis, the iridium market has been broadly balanced in recent years" — a 2025 deficit of about 3% of demand. Yet from the 2008 annual average of 448 USD to the 2021 average of 5,158 USD the price rose to 11.5 times its level. What moves iridium is stock movement in a seven-tonne market, which Johnson Matthey assigns not to demand but to "a movement in market stocks" — and those movements are not published.
Performance Table
Go to tableThe figures follow the quotation currency: a sterling return would differ by the movement of the pound.
Seasonality
Go to chartIn a seven-tonne market one operational event outweighs any calendar effect, so a seasonal pattern here is an artefact until a supply-side cause can be named for it.
Performance Calendar (Heatmap)
Go to calendarA pale field means "the quoting desk did not move" — on 26% of days it did not.
Iridium Price by Weight and Units
Iridium is quoted in two units at once: Johnson Matthey in US dollars per troy ounce, the continental refiners in euros per kilogram; one troy ounce is 31.1035 grams. The physical side runs the other way from rhodium: at 22.56 g/cm³ iridium is, with osmium, the densest element there is, so a ten-centimetre cube weighs 22.6 kilograms and a piece that feels light for its size is not iridium.
There are no bullion coins; what trades is sponge, grains, bars and fabricated material. One British point follows from the form rather than the metal: the Hallmarking Act 1973 exempts bars and bullion from marking, and the thresholds for compulsory marking are set for gold, silver, platinum and palladium — no iridium threshold is documented. Whether the Act reaches iridium at all our sources do not answer, so the gap is stated.
What Iridium Is Used For
Iridium is the opposite of rhodium: rhodium hangs on one application, iridium spreads across four blocks, none reaching half. Total demand in 2025 was 236,000 ounces (7.3 tonnes).
| Demand, 1,000 oz | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 | Share 2025 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Electrochemical | 120 | 94 | 100 | 42.4% |
| Other (not broken down) | 70 | 68 | 69 | 29.2% |
| Chemical | 31 | 37 | 34 | 14.4% |
| Electrical and electronics | 25 | 27 | 33 | 14.0% |
| Total | 246 | 226 | 236 | 100% |
Johnson Matthey PGM Market Report, May 2026. The first two rows are displaced in the source PDF and were cross-checked against its tonnes table, which resolves 2025 unambiguously: 3.1 t electrochemical, 2.1 t other.
Hydrogen is a market that is due, not one that carries: iridium is the anode catalyst in PEM water electrolysis. Expectation drove the price to its then record in 2020 and 2021; the demand did not follow. Only for 2026 does Johnson Matthey write of "the first significant demand for iridium in PEM electrolysis". This page quotes no metal loading per electrolyser or per kilowatt: those figures circulate widely, but none could be established from a primary source.
Key Drivers of the Iridium Price
Iridium is nowhere mined as a main product: the IPA states it is "not mined as a standalone metal but is recovered together with the other PGMs from the same ore deposit". By mass it is only about 2% of the platinum group basket, the smallest share of the five traded metals.
2025, Johnson Matthey PGM Market Report, May 2026, and the IPA iridium factsheet.
The supply series is the flattest of any platinum group metal: between 6.8 and 7.4 tonnes in every year from 2021 to 2026, through the record of 2021, the hydrogen enthusiasm and the highs of 2026 alike. What decides availability is which reef is being mined, and lead times run from 8 to 18 months to 6 to 8 years.
No country figures exist, so this page gives none: Johnson Matthey reports a world total only, with no breakdown by country. The IPA puts South Africa at 80% of global mine output, followed by Zimbabwe and Russia. Per-country tonnages do not exist in the public record, so any such table is an estimate dressed as a measurement.
The hardest finding on this page: "There is currently essentially no open-loop recycling of iridium globally" (IPA, May 2026). Johnson Matthey accordingly reports no secondary supply for iridium at all, where spent autocatalysts deliver roughly 31% of total rhodium supply. The reason is physical: a spark plug contains a few milligrams, and no collection system comparable to the one for autocatalysts exists.
A crustal abundance specific to iridium is missing here on purpose: the IPA names none per element, and the value in wide circulation is identical for iridium, rhodium and ruthenium. A number that cannot be told apart from two other elements is not a fact about iridium.
Buying Iridium in the UK
- ◆ The spread is the main cost, and the fabrication premium comes on top. A refiner’s purchase price sat 30.0% below its sales price on every one of 142 measured days — more than four times the platinum figure of 7.0% — and fabricated metal cost a median 5.8% more again.
- ◆ No bullion coin exists, which matters more here than anywhere else on this site: the most valuable British relief for metal investors attaches to sterling coins. Selling means finding the one buyer, and on 26% of days the reference quotation did not even move.
- ◆ Exchange-traded products are not reported. Johnson Matthey gives holdings for platinum, palladium and rhodium and none for iridium — the absence of a mention rather than proof, and itself informative about scale. A basket is no substitute, since iridium is 2% of it by mass.
What we deliberately do not claim: retail dealer premiums, minimum order sizes and typical bar denominations for iridium could not be established from a primary source, and no sterling price for a retail bar is given here for the same reason. Any percentage quoted for those elsewhere should be checked against a written offer. The 30.0% refiner spread and the 5.8% fabrication premium are measured; a retail markup sits on top of both.
What British Investor Protection Does Not Cover
Bullion is not a regulated investment in the United Kingdom. Dealing in physical metal is not an FCA-regulated activity: no Financial Services Compensation Scheme cover and no Financial Ombudsman Service. The perimeter here runs around the benchmark, not the trade. What applies is the Consumer Rights Act 2015 (ss. 9 to 11, 30-day right to reject), while regulation 28(1)(a) of the Consumer Contracts Regulations 2013 removes the 14-day right to cancel for goods whose price depends on financial-market fluctuations. And a high price here does not pull out supply, it pushes out use: after 2021 the electrical row of the demand table halved in a single year.
Iridium, VAT and Capital Gains Tax in the United Kingdom
VAT: 20%, Because the Statute Says "Gold"
Physical iridium carries the standard rate of 20% on the full price. The relief British investors know from the gold pages sits in Group 15 of Schedule 9 to the Value Added Tax Act 1994 and is written for investment gold alone. Note which word the statute does not use: it does not say "precious metal"; it says gold. No equivalent provision exists for iridium, ruthenium, rhodium, platinum, palladium or silver, so all are standard-rated in every form, import included — and HMRC excludes precious metals from the margin schemes (VATMARG02100), so VAT falls on the whole price.
Capital Gains Tax: No Holding Period, and No Coin Relief Here
A gain on selling physical iridium is a chargeable gain under the Taxation of Chargeable Gains Act 1992, and British law has no holding period: a gain after two weeks is treated exactly like one after twenty years. The rate is 18% within the basic rate band of £37,700 and 24% above it, unchanged since 30 October 2024, after an Annual Exempt Amount of £3,000 (s. 1K) — an allowance, not a cliff edge. A bar is a chattel, so s. 262 caps the tax above £6,000 of consideration at five thirds of the excess.
The relief that makes British gold investing distinctive cannot reach this metal: gains on sovereigns from 1837 and the gold Britannia fall outside the charge because those coins are sterling legal tender (Coinage Act 1971 s. 2(1)) and sterling is not a chargeable asset (s. 21(1)(b), HMRC CG78305) — and no iridium coin exists. Self Assessment is needed if the gain exceeds the allowance or the proceeds exceed £50,000; cash has no statutory ceiling, but from £10,000 (SI 2026/621 reg. 9, ECSH51525) the dealer owes identification duties as a registered High Value Dealer. No wrapper helps: an ISA may not hold physical metal, a SIPP only gold bars from 995 fineness (SI 2006/1959 art. 2, PTM125100).
Three questions stay open on purpose, because filling them would mean inventing an authority. Whether a domestic reverse charge applies to business sales of platinum group metal scrap our sources do not establish; they do say the Scrap Metal Dealers Act 2013 excludes gold and silver (s. 21(7)) and nothing about iridium. There is no statutory figure at which private investing becomes trading. And the border declaration duty attaches to cash from £10,000 and, in Northern Ireland, to gold — not to iridium.
The honest basis of this section: in none of the 27 countries covered by this site does a decision, binding ruling or case law exist that deals with rhodium, ruthenium or iridium by name. Legal definitions exist in a few — Czechia, Poland and Slovakia — but not here. Every conclusion above therefore rests on the metal-neutral wording of a provision or on the reach of a code that names gold alone — the legal position as the statutes read, not tax advice.