By Rocco Clayfield, Founder & Director, GoldPaid Ltd · Published 6 August 2026
The short answer, and the one honest limit
A kitchen scale answers the question most people actually have, which is “is this lot worth the trip to the Post Office?” For that job it is fine. Nine grams of broken 9ct chain and ninety grams of it are obviously different propositions, and a scale that reads in whole grams tells you which one you are holding in about ten seconds.
What it cannot do is settle an argument about money. A scale that displays 12 g is telling you the true weight is somewhere between 11.5 g and 12.5 g, and that is before you add the scale’s own error, which is a separate thing from the size of the steps on the display. Treat the home figure as a bracket rather than a number, and nothing about it will mislead you.
How much is a whole-gram reading actually worth?
This is the part worth internalising, because gold is dense and the numbers are larger than people expect. Spot is quoted for fine gold, so the metal in one gram of an alloy is the fine-gold price multiplied by the purity decimal: 0.375 for 9ct, 0.585 for 14ct, 0.750 for 18ct, 0.916 for 22ct.
| Carat | Metal value per gram at spot, 6 Aug 2026 | A 0.5 g reading error | A 1 g reading error |
|---|---|---|---|
| 9ct (375) | £38.14 | £19.07 | £38.14 |
| 14ct (585) | £59.49 | £29.75 | £59.49 |
| 18ct (750) | £76.28 | £38.14 | £76.28 |
| 22ct (916) | £93.16 | £46.58 | £93.16 |
Read that as the cost of imprecision rather than as an offer. Take an 18ct wedding band that truly weighs 6.4 g. A scale reading in whole grams may show 6 g, which understates the metal by about £30 at that day’s spot. The same band on a 0.01 g pocket scale reads 6.40 g and there is nothing left to wonder about. The gap between the metal value in this table and what any buyer pays is a separate question entirely, covered in spot price versus scrap price.
One practical consequence follows immediately. If you are weighing a mixed lot, weigh each carat group in a single pass rather than piece by piece. A whole-gram scale applies its rounding once per weighing, so twenty separate weighings can accumulate twenty roundings, while one weighing of the whole 9ct pile carries only one.
Resolution is not the same thing as accuracy
Two different limits are at work and they get conflated constantly. Resolution, or readability, is the size of the smallest step the display can show: 1 g on most kitchen scales. Accuracy is how far the reading can sit from the truth, and a manufacturer will often specify something like plus or minus 1 g or 2 g across the range. A scale can therefore show a tidy whole number and still be two grams out, which on 18ct is more than £150 of metal.
| Type of scale | Typical readability | What it is honestly good for |
|---|---|---|
| Mechanical or spring kitchen scale | 5 g to 25 g graduations | Not usable for gold. A single graduation can be worth more than the item on it. |
| Standard digital kitchen scale | 1 g | Deciding whether a lot is worth posting. Not for checking an offer. |
| Digital kitchen or coffee scale in precision mode | 0.1 g | Single pieces and small lots. Capacity usually drops when precision mode is on. |
| Pocket jewellery scale | 0.01 g | What you want if the lot is 18ct or above, or if you intend to check anyone’s arithmetic. |
| Trade-approved bench scale, Class I or II | 0.01 g or finer, verified | What a buyer is legally required to use. Marked CE or UKCA with an “M”, or Crown stamped on older equipment. |
There is also a minimum load. Many kitchen scales will not register anything below roughly 2 g to 5 g, and some switch themselves off if the load does not change. A single stud earring or a fine chain may read 0 g. That is the scale declining to answer, not the item weighing nothing. Items under 1 g of gold are also legally exempt from UK hallmarking (Hallmarking Act 1973), which is why small unmarked pieces are common and why they need testing rather than weighing to identify.
Grams, troy ounces, pennyweights: the conversions
Weigh in grams and convert only at the end, if at all. Grams are what UK buyers quote in, what calibrated scales report in, and what appears on a written offer.
| Unit | In grams | Note |
|---|---|---|
| 1 gram (g) | 1 g | The working unit for UK gold pricing |
| 1 troy ounce (ozt) | 31.1034768 g exactly | The bullion unit, used for spot prices and bars |
| 1 pennyweight (dwt) | 1.5551738 g | One twentieth of a troy ounce; still seen in older trade and US quotes |
| 1 avoirdupois ounce (oz) | 28.349523125 g | The “oz” setting on kitchen scales. Never used for precious metal |
| 1 grain | 0.06479891 g | 24 grains make one pennyweight |
| 1 tola | 11.6638 g | Three eighths of a troy ounce; South Asian jewellery |
Going the other way: 1 g is 0.0321507 troy ounces, or 0.643015 pennyweights. So 31.10 g of gold is one troy ounce, and a 20 g bracelet is 0.643 of a troy ounce.
Not sure how any of this applies to your own items? Send a photo on WhatsApp and ask. We answer honestly, there is no obligation, and nothing is posted until you decide. Or call 07763 741067, 8am to 9pm, 7 days a week.
How to get closer with the scales you already have
None of this turns a kitchen scale into a jeweller’s balance, but each step removes a real source of error, and together they usually take a whole-gram scale from “roughly right” to “reliably within a gram”.
- Put the scale on a hard, level surface. A worktop, not a hob, a draining board, a folded tea towel or the arm of a sofa. Load cells read anything that flexes underneath them.
- Change the battery if you have not recently. A failing battery is the single most common cause of a scale drifting between readings.
- Switch the display to grams and leave it there. Ignore the oz setting entirely.
- If the scale has a 0.1 g or precision mode, sold on many coffee and baking scales, use it. Maximum capacity usually falls, which does not matter for jewellery.
- Tare a small bowl or saucer on the platform first, so small items sit in the centre and cannot slide to an edge. Off-centre loads read low on cheap scales.
- Sort by carat before you weigh, using the hallmarks. Weigh each carat group as one pile rather than piece by piece, so the rounding applies once.
- Weigh each group three times, lifting everything off in between. If the three readings disagree, that spread is your genuine error bar, and it is worth writing down alongside the weight.
- Sanity-check the scale against coins of known specification before you trust the reading (table below).
- Photograph the display with the items in the bowl, then keep the photo with your dated photographs of the pieces. It costs nothing and it is your own record.
The coin check works because UK circulating coins are struck to published specifications, so a handful of change is a free set of approximate reference weights.
| Coin | Royal Mint specification | Useful combination |
|---|---|---|
| 20p | 5.00 g | Four make 20.00 g |
| 50p | 8.00 g | Five make 40.00 g |
| £1, twelve-sided, 2017 onwards | 8.75 g | With one £2, 20.75 g |
| £2 | 12.00 g | Five make 60.00 g |
Be honest about what that check proves. Those are mint specifications for new coins, and circulating coins lose a little metal to wear and pick up a little dirt, so a reading of 19 g or 21 g on four 20p pieces tells you something useful while a reading of 19.9 g does not. Use it to catch a scale that is badly wrong, not to certify one that is nearly right.
Gross weight and payable weight are different numbers
Even a perfect home weight is a gross weight: everything on the platform, gold and not gold together. What a buyer pays on is the payable weight, the precious metal actually present once the rest is excluded. On a plain solid chain the two figures are the same. On a stone-set ring, a charm bracelet or a watch they can differ by half or more, and that difference, not dishonesty, is behind most surprised reactions to an offer.
- Stones of every kind, from diamonds to paste, along with the cement holding them in
- Steel clasp springs, pins and watch movements
- Enamel, niello and inlay
- Lac or resin filling inside Indian bangles and kadas, and the cores inside some hollow rope chains
- Gold-plated or rolled-gold components attached to solid items
- Base-metal extender chains and replacement clasps fitted during repairs
So the useful home routine is to note the gross weight, then note what is on the piece that plainly is not gold. A written offer should show both numbers, item by item, so the deduction is visible rather than assumed. If you want to run the full check on a figure you have been given, was my gold offer fair works through the arithmetic and the percentage bands to read it against.
Why the assay weight is the one that counts
This is not a matter of whose scale is trusted more. Weighing gold for trade in Great Britain is regulated. Under the Non-automatic Weighing Instruments Regulations 2016, Schedule 4, a person must not use for trade any regulated instrument other than one of accuracy classification Class I or Class II for transactions relating to gold, silver, platinum or palladium, or to precious stones and pearls (legislation.gov.uk). Class III and Class IIII instruments, the classes covering ordinary shop and market scales, are prohibited for that purpose. Kitchen scales are not in any of those classes, because they are not approved for trade use at all.
Instruments used for trade must also carry the marks: a CE or UKCA mark together with the metrology “M” mark, or a Crown stamp on older equipment, plus a data plate showing capacity and accuracy. Equipment bearing a six-pointed star has been rejected by an inspector, and using it for legal purposes is an offence (Business Companion, Chartered Trading Standards Institute). You are entitled to see the scale and the reading. A buyer who weighs your gold out of sight has removed the one number you could otherwise check.
At GoldPaid the sequence is purity first, then weight. Each piece is XRF tested to establish what the alloy actually is, mixed lots are separated by carat so nothing is paid at the wrong rate, and each group is weighed to 0.01 g on calibrated scales. The written valuation shows purity, weight, the rate on the day and the figure, per item, which is what makes it checkable against your own numbers. The method is set out on how we value gold, and the day’s fine-gold rate is on gold price today.
Expect the two weights to differ slightly, and do not read anything into a small gap. A whole-gram scale and a 0.01 g scale disagreeing by a few tenths is arithmetic, not evidence. A gap of several grams on a solid lot is worth raising, and the right way to raise it is to ask for the recorded weight per item so the two lists can be compared line by line.
When a kitchen scale is not the right tool at all
Three situations where we would tell you plainly to stop weighing and do something else.
Bullion coins. Weight is one of the authentication checks, and the tolerances are tight: a full sovereign is 7.98 g gross and a one-ounce Krugerrand 33.93 g gross. A scale that rounds to the nearest gram cannot perform that check in any meaningful way. If you are testing a coin rather than valuing scrap, you need 0.01 g resolution and a diameter and thickness measurement alongside it.
Anything that may be worth more than its metal. A signed piece from a recognised house, a good gemstone, a hallmarked Georgian or Victorian item, a period watch. For these the weight is close to the least important number on the page, and a metal-price buyer, ourselves included, is the wrong first stop. A specialist dealer, a jeweller or an auction house is the better route, and an honest buyer will say so. The hallmark guide helps you work out which side of that line a piece sits on.
Deciding whether to accept an offer. Use the home weight to decide whether to start the process, not to conclude it. If your figure and the recorded figure disagree in a way that matters, ask before accepting; declining costs nothing and the items come back.
What to do with the number once you have it
Send it with photographs rather than on its own. A rough weight plus clear pictures of the hallmarks, clasps and any stones gives a far better indicative figure than either would separately, because purity and construction move the number as much as mass does. How to photograph jewellery for a remote valuation covers the shots that are worth taking. Photos and questions go to 07763 741067 on WhatsApp, or the same number by phone.
Indicative figures given from photographs and a home weight are exactly that: indicative. Nothing is firm before inspection, because purity, weight, stones, solder, plating and other non-gold components all move the result, and the precious-metal market moves daily. Our published per-gram rates and their calibration date sit on the gold calculator.
If you go ahead, Royal Mail cover may be available up to £2,500 depending on the postal method and cover level used, so weigh the lot at home partly to judge whether one parcel is the right way to send it. On arrival your items are tested and weighed, and a written itemised valuation comes back to you. If you accept, payment is by Faster Payments within one working hour of acceptance, usually within 30 minutes during working hours. If you decline, everything is returned free of charge, tracked. The whole sequence is in how to sell gold safely by post. GoldPaid Ltd is a UK postal buyer, company number 17382540, ICO registration ZC214216, rated 4.7 on Trustpilot from 24 reviews.
Sources
- The Non-automatic Weighing Instruments Regulations 2016, Schedule 4, restricting trade weighing of gold, silver, platinum, palladium, precious stones and pearls to Class I or Class II instruments: legislation.gov.uk/uksi/2016/1152
- Business Companion (Chartered Trading Standards Institute), Weighing equipment for legal use, on CE/UKCA and “M” marks, Crown stamps and rejected equipment: businesscompanion.info
- LBMA, The Troy Ounce: one troy ounce is 31.1034768 grams exactly: lbma.org.uk
- The Royal Mint, UK coin designs and specifications: 20p 5.00 g, 50p 8.00 g, £1 8.75 g, £2 12.00 g: royalmint.com
- Hallmarking Act 1973, Schedule 1, exemption weight of 1 g for gold: legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/1973/43
- Fine gold price of £101.70 per gram and £3,163.19 per troy ounce, BullionVault GBP spot, 6 August 2026.
Common questions
Are kitchen scales accurate enough to weigh gold?
For a rough estimate, yes. For a payment figure, no. Most digital kitchen scales read in whole grams, so a reading is about half a gram uncertain before the scale’s own error is added, and many are specified at plus or minus 1 g to 2 g. At £101.70 a gram of fine gold on 6 August 2026 that is roughly £19 to £76 of metal depending on carat. Use the home weight to decide whether to post, not to decide whether an offer is right.
What is the difference between resolution and accuracy on a scale?
Resolution is the size of the smallest step the display can show, typically 1 g on a kitchen scale. Accuracy is how far the reading can be from the truth. A scale can show a neat whole number and still be two grams out, so a tidy display is not evidence of a correct weight.
Why does my kitchen scale show 0 g for my ring?
Because of minimum load. Many kitchen scales do not register below roughly 2 g to 5 g, and some switch off if the load does not change. The item is not weightless; the scale is declining to answer. Put a bowl on first, tare it, then add the item, or use a scale that reads to 0.1 g or 0.01 g.
Can I use the ounce setting on kitchen scales for gold?
No, and it is a costly mistake. The oz on a kitchen scale is the avoirdupois ounce of 28.3495 g, used for food. Gold is priced per troy ounce of 31.1035 g, about 9.7% heavier. Weighing in kitchen ounces and pricing per troy ounce overstates the metal by nearly a tenth. Weigh in grams instead.
How can I check my scales are roughly right at home?
Use coins struck to published specifications. A 20p is 5.00 g, a 50p 8.00 g, the twelve-sided £1 8.75 g and a £2 12.00 g (Royal Mint). Four 20p pieces should read 20 g. Circulated coins wear and pick up dirt, so this catches a badly wrong scale rather than certifying a nearly right one.
Do gold buyers have to use special scales?
Yes. Under the Non-automatic Weighing Instruments Regulations 2016, Schedule 4, trade weighing of gold, silver, platinum, palladium, precious stones and pearls must use a Class I or Class II instrument; Class III and IIII are prohibited for those transactions. Trade instruments carry a CE or UKCA mark with an “M”, or a Crown stamp on older equipment. Kitchen scales are not approved for trade use at all.
Why is the buyer’s weight lower than the weight I got at home?
Usually because the two are measuring different things. Your figure is gross weight, everything on the platform. A buyer pays on payable weight, the precious metal present once stones, springs, clasps, watch movements, enamel, resin filling and plated parts are excluded. Ask for the recorded weight per item so the two lists can be compared line by line.
Is it worth buying jewellery scales?
If the lot is 18ct or above, or you intend to check anyone’s arithmetic, yes. A pocket scale reading to 0.01 g costs a few pounds, which is less than the value of a single gram of 9ct at current prices. For a handful of broken 9ct chain that you already know you want to sell, the kitchen scale is enough.
Does weight alone decide what my gold is worth?
No. The offer is purity multiplied by payable weight multiplied by the market rate on the day, less the buyer’s margin. Weight is one of three measured inputs, and it is the only one you can check at home. Purity needs testing and the rate changes every trading day, which is why nothing is firm before inspection.