Jewelry Designers Embrace 10k Gold as Prices Rise and Sales Soar

Marla Aaron's rosy 10k Micro Babylock, a compact lock-style charm priced at $595, was built specifically for hardness and durability. That design brief tells you everything about where demi-fine jewelry is heading.

Gold prices surged nearly 50% in 2025, and both gold and silver enjoyed record-setting rallies before continuing to swing violently into 2026. For jewelry designers who price in dollars and buy in troy ounces, the math has become brutal. The response from several demi-fine brands has been pointed: drop the starting karat from 14 to 10, hold the craftsmanship, and keep the piece accessible without abandoning solid gold entirely.

Designers and brands say 10-karat gold is moving from a marginal option to a deliberate design and pricing strategy as gold prices stay volatile. Ana Luisa made the call early. The brand began offering 10-karat pieces in March 2023, and the bet paid off: David Benayoun, co-founder and CEO, says that over the last 18 months, Ana Luisa's solid gold category tripled in sales. The brand now sells across three tiers, fashion jewelry, 10k solid gold, and 14k-plated pieces, a structure that lets customers step into real gold without the sticker shock that accompanies 14-karat minimums.

"Ten-karat, in our opinion, is the same durability as 14 karats and our intuition was that customers were completely open to that new category," Benayoun said.

The metallurgy backs him up, partly. Mejuri's materials documentation notes that 10k gold contains 41.7% pure gold, with the remaining 58.3% made up of an intentional mix of metals such as copper, silver, and zinc. By comparison, 14-karat gold contains 58.3% pure gold. That higher alloy content makes 10-karat options less fragile than softer, purer gold, which is a genuine functional argument for everyday pieces. The trade-off is hypoallergenicity: 10-karat gold is the least hypoallergenic of gold karatages, a consideration worth weighing for anyone with metal sensitivities, since the elevated copper and zinc content is typically what triggers reactions.

Mejuri, which previously offered only 14-karat items and 18-karat vermeil, is now the latest affordable luxury jewelry brand to focus on the 10-karat space. Mejuri positions its 10k solid gold as offering "the beauty of 14k solid gold with added durability, making it perfect for everyday wear." The brand describes 10k's more muted tone as a "subtle, timeless look" and frames its lower pure gold content as making it "a more accessible option without compromising on long-lasting quality." Notably, Mejuri sources 94% recycled gold from scrap or post-consumer materials and works with independently verified suppliers, a supply-chain claim that carries more weight than most, given that it's independently verified rather than simply self-reported.

The current climate is creating what Vogue has called a new karat category in demi-fine jewelry, with brands that once anchored at 14 karats shifting down to include 10k solid gold, balancing the precious-metal selling point against a more reachable price.

Behind the scenes, sourcing the metal itself has become its own discipline. Benayoun described a procurement method his team calls "gold locks," in which Ana Luisa pays a deposit on the gold it plans to use over a set timeframe. The deposit costs the brand more upfront, but it stabilizes retail pricing even when spot prices swing. "We're trying to find ways to mitigate the volatility of the metal, and it's almost like every technique they used to have in the industry for the last couple of years is out the window because the volatility has increased so much," he said.

That volatility is not easing. Gold had a volatile start to 2026, moving above $5,000 per ounce on January 26 before speculative buying pushed it to an intraday high of $5,595 by January 29. Higher prices have already shown signs of dampening broader jewelry consumption. For brands committed to keeping real gold accessible, the 10-karat tier is no longer a concession; it is the strategy.