Those tiny stamps inside a ring or under a spoon are a legal record. Read correctly, they tell you the metal, its purity, who made the piece and where it was tested. This guide shows you how to read all of them.
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Three marks are compulsory. Sponsor, fineness and assay office — the rest are optional extras.
A hallmark is an official set of marks struck into precious metal to guarantee its purity. In the United Kingdom, hallmarking is governed by the Hallmarking Act 1973 and carried out by independent assay offices, not by the maker. Because the testing is done by a third party, a hallmark is one of the oldest forms of consumer protection in Britain — proof, struck into the metal itself, that the item is what it claims to be.
It is an offence to describe an item as gold, silver, platinum or palladium in the course of trade without the correct hallmark, unless it falls under a weight exemption. That is why a hallmark carries weight when you come to value or sell a piece: it is independent evidence of the metal and its purity.
Every current UK hallmark has three parts that must be present. Learn these three and you can read the essentials of almost any modern piece.
The fineness, or millesimal, number tells you the purity in parts per thousand. The same system runs across all four precious metals, so once you know it you can read gold, silver, platinum and palladium alike.
| Metal | Fineness marks | In everyday terms |
|---|---|---|
| Gold | 375, 585, 750, 916, 990, 999 | 9, 14, 18, 22 and 24 carat |
| Silver | 800, 925, 958, 999 | 925 is sterling, 958 is Britannia |
| Platinum | 850, 900, 950, 999 | 950 is the usual jewellery standard |
| Palladium | 500, 950, 999 | 950 is the common standard |
For gold specifically, dividing the carat by 24 gives the fraction behind the number: 9 ÷ 24 is 0.375, hence 375; 18 carat is 0.750, hence 750. If you want to turn that purity into a metal value, our companion guide walks through the sum in how much is my gold worth.
Four assay offices operate in the United Kingdom today, and each strikes its own town mark. The symbol tells you where a piece was tested — not necessarily where it was made or sold.
| Assay office | Town mark |
|---|---|
| London | A leopard's head |
| Birmingham | An anchor |
| Sheffield | A rose |
| Edinburgh | A castle |
On older pieces you may find marks from offices that have since closed, such as Chester (a shield of arms), Glasgow (a tree, bird, bell and fish) or Dublin (a crowned harp). A closed-office mark is a useful clue to age and can add interest to a piece.
Beyond the three compulsory marks, a hallmark may carry optional extras that add detail and character:
A hallmark confirms what a piece is, not what it is worth. Two identical-looking rings with the same fineness mark can differ hugely in value once maker, age and condition are taken into account. Read the marks first, then have the whole piece assessed.
An absent hallmark does not always mean an item is not precious metal. Very light pieces are exempt: gold under one gram, silver under 7.78 grams, platinum under half a gram and palladium under one gram do not have to be marked. Some imported or antique pieces predate current rules, and marks can wear away with decades of use. If a piece is unmarked but you suspect it is gold or silver, it can still be tested — do not assume, and do not sell it as scrap without checking.
A sponsor is the person or business that submitted an item for hallmarking, not necessarily its designer or the workshop that made every part. Record the initials together with their surrounding shape and the assay-office symbol. Initials alone are not a safe attribution: the same letters can occur in different registers or periods. GOV.UK explains the three compulsory marks.
It dates hallmarking, where present, rather than proving when the object was designed or assembled. The letter is now optional. Repeating alphabets require attention to letter style, surround and office: a bare letter is not enough. The London Assay Office describes current and historical marks.
| Metal | Exemption weight |
|---|---|
| Gold | 1 gram |
| Silver | 7.78 grams |
| Platinum | 0.5 gram |
| Palladium | 1 gram |
These are precious-metal thresholds, not permission to identify any unmarked yellow item as gold. GOV.UK says items below the thresholds do not require a hallmark; special exemptions and recognised foreign marks need their own checks. A buying enquiry about untested material is different from offering an article in trade with a precious-metal description. Ask an assay office or Trading Standards about an uncertain sale. Official hallmarking guidance.
375, 585, 750 and 916 denote parts per thousand for the corresponding gold standards; 990 and 999 are higher-fineness standards. Do not round 585 down to an unexplained 14/24 fraction when checking a calculation. A number is not a complete UK hallmark on its own. Birmingham Assay Office gold-mark guide.
The Common Control Mark is a recognised Convention mark, not a brand signature. Recognition and exemption rules vary between countries. Check GOV.UK Convention guidance rather than assuming every foreign stamp is interchangeable with a UK hallmark.
Continue with foreign gold marks, unhallmarked jewellery or selling gold jewellery. A hallmark records metal evidence; it does not certify a gemstone, designer attribution or resale price. Read how to check a gold calculator before converting a fineness assumption into a monetary result.
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Get a free estimate →A UK hallmark has three compulsory parts: the sponsor's mark, which identifies the maker or company that submitted the item; the fineness mark, a number showing the metal and its purity in parts per thousand; and the assay office mark, a town symbol showing which office tested and struck the piece. Together they confirm the metal has been independently tested and meets the stated standard.
The number is the millesimal fineness, the parts per thousand of pure precious metal. For gold, 375 is 9 carat, 585 is 14 carat, 750 is 18 carat and 916 is 22 carat. For silver, 925 is sterling and 958 is Britannia. Platinum is usually 950, and palladium commonly 950 as well. The higher the number, the more pure precious metal the piece contains.
The four assay offices operating in the United Kingdom each have a town mark: London uses a leopard's head, Birmingham an anchor, Sheffield a rose, and Edinburgh a castle. The office mark on your item tells you where it was tested and hallmarked. Older pieces may carry marks from offices that have since closed, such as Chester, Glasgow or Dublin.
In the UK it is an offence to describe an item as gold, silver, platinum or palladium without a hallmark, but there are weight exemptions for very light items. Gold under one gram, silver under 7.78 grams, platinum under 0.5 grams and palladium under one gram do not have to be marked. So a genuine gold piece may be unmarked simply because it is small, which is why testing still matters.
A hallmark confirms the metal and its purity, which is a key part of any valuation, but it does not set the value on its own. Weight, the live metal price, the maker, the age and the condition all matter, and a signed or antique piece can be worth far more than its metal. Treat the hallmark as reliable evidence of what the item is, then have the whole piece assessed.
Send a clear photo of the hallmark and the piece for a free estimate. We read the marks, test the metal and put the value in writing. Opened and documented. Anything you decline comes back free.