Key takeaways
- Jewellery prices include making charges, design, the seller’s margin and tax on top of the gold.
- The calculator values the gold content at today’s international price.
- Investment gold costs more than that price too, so compare all-in prices per gram.
What are you paying for when you buy gold jewellery?
The price of a gold necklace or bangle has four parts:
- The gold: weight × purity × the gold price that day.
- Making charges: the cost of design and labour, often quoted per gram or as a percentage. Intricate wedding pieces cost more to make.
- Wastage or margin: some jewellers add a percentage for metal lost in making, or simply a retail margin.
- Tax: in Canada, GST or HST applies to jewellery.
None of this is wrong. Craft costs money. But when you sell jewellery, a buyer usually pays only for the gold, and sometimes less than its full value. So the more of the price that went to making charges, the more you lose if you ever sell.
Jewellery or investment gold: which holds value better?
If your goal is to wear it, jewellery is the right choice. If your goal is to save, investment gold (bars, coins, gold ETFs or digital gold) puts more of each dollar into gold. It isn’t free either: bars and coins sell at a premium over the spot price, and apps and ETFs charge fees. Compare the all-in price per gram of pure gold, and the price you’d get back when you sell.
Read jewellery vs investment gold for a full comparison, and 22K vs 24K gold for why purity matters.
What should a gold jewellery receipt show?
Ask for an itemised bill before you pay. It should show the gross weight and the net gold weight (without stones), the karat or hallmark, the gold rate per gram used, the making charge (per gram or as a percentage), any stone or wastage charges, and the tax. With those numbers you can check the bill against today’s rate and compare one shop with another.
Keep the receipt. You may need it to prove the karat and weight when you sell or exchange the piece, for insurance, or to show customs where and when you bought it.
Saving in pure gold, gram by gram
RemitBee Gold, launching in early 2027 from Settle Canada’s sponsor RemitBee, will let you buy pure 24K gold from $10 at the live market price with one 0.5% fee. You can join the waitlist. Whatever you use, check the fee and the price you can sell back at.
What to do next
See today’s rate by purity on the gold price by karat page, or value a piece you own with the gold value calculator.