What is the Difference Between Carat and Karat?

With the rising prices of gold, people are now getting into the investment of selling their gold. Often, they will go into studying how much they can get out of their gold. "Do you spell it as karat or carat"?
This article will help you define the differences between the words.

A karat is a measure of purity for gold. This was always used in the western part of the world. The higher the number of karats, the purer the gold was. For example, an 18-karat watch is purer in gold than a 12-karat watch. The highest you can go for purity is 24-karat, which means pure gold. This measurement is rarely used in making jewelry or anything else of value that gets worn because this is also considered the softest form of gold. You can actually bump into something with your 24-karat piece and it will dent the gold. This is why most pieces of jewelry are made from 10, 12, or 18-karat gold. The word karat does not explain weight or size, just the purity. Sometimes you will even see objects marked with "kt" instead of "K". This also refers to karats.

In British territory and Australia, they use three numbers to indicate the amount of pure gold,(001-999) followed by the letters "ct" or "c" to measure the purity of gold. The higher the number engraved on the object, the purer the gold. This is one of the biggest reasons everyone started getting confused. Gold pieces that came to America from these parts were read wrong and the simple system of karats and carats got turned around.

A carat is a measure of weight for precious stones and gems and pearls used mainly in America. A carat is exactly 200 milligrams and this term makes buying and selling precious objects easier to identify with, whether it's a sapphire, pearl, diamond, or emerald.

The word Carat is used in almost everything jeweled. If you have an 8-carat diamond, you are holding 8x200 milligrams of diamond, which equals to 1600 milligrams. If you are holding an eight carat pearl, you are still holding 8x200 milligrams of pearl, which still equals 1600 milligrams.

So, the next time you see an ad in the paper, or on the television and they say that they are buying gold by the karat, make sure they are not trying to trick you into selling your gold cheaper than what it is actually going for. Most ads will state that they are paying for gold by the Carat when they are actually paying by the Karat. In most websites you will come to, there are still some who generally get these two words wrong. I have even seen this mistake in some of the bigger jewelry stores and on-line shops. There are some websites that give out definitions of these two words, but get the meaning wrong, so If you ever get confused, just remember these two things:

KARAT= Measure of purity for gold.

CARAT=measure of weight equaling 200 milligrams.