Guide
What is rhodium, and is rhodium plating worth anything?
Rhodium is one of the rarest and most expensive precious metals. You'll most often meet it as a bright plating on white gold and silver jewelry, and that plating is far too thin to add anything when you sell.
Updated October 30, 2026 · Prices as of November 3, 2026, 4:45 p.m. Pacific
Rhodium on jewelry
White gold isn't naturally bright white: it's yellow gold alloyed with whiter metals, and it has a faint warm tint. Jewelers electroplate most white gold with a microscopically thin layer of rhodium to make it brilliant white, and plate some sterling silver the same way to stop it tarnishing. The plating wears off with use, which is why white gold rings slowly turn slightly yellow and get replated.
There's so little rhodium on a plated piece that it has no value when you sell. A white gold ring is paid on its gold; see white gold value. A plated sterling piece is paid as sterling; see sterling silver jewelry.
Rhodium the metal
Rhodium is a platinum-group metal, mined mostly in South Africa alongside platinum and palladium. Most of it goes into catalytic converters, which makes its price swing harder than any other precious metal's: it broke $20,000 an ounce for the first time in January 2021 and peaked near $30,000 that March, then fell back sharply as demand cooled.
Today Kitco quotes rhodium at a bid of $8,550 and an ask of $9,550 a troy ounce (as of November 3, 2026, 4:45 p.m. Pacific). The gap between them is much wider than for gold or platinum, a sign of how thinly rhodium trades.
Physical rhodium is sold mostly as small bars and as powder or sponge. It's thinly traded, and buyers' prices sit well below the quoted market price. We don't publish a rhodium bid; ask us about rhodium bars and we'll quote them in writing.
Related guides: The six platinum-group metals · White gold · Platinum or white gold? · Platinum jewelry · Is it gold-plated? · Gold-filled vs gold-plated
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