Our Methodology

We review legitimate, US-accessible precious metals dealers with established track records in online bullion sales. To qualify for review, a dealer must have a verifiable business address, publicly available pricing on at least some products, and a history of completed customer transactions.

We do not review consultation-only wealth advisors, local coin shops, or dealers that operate exclusively through private appointments. These are different business models that our scoring framework is not designed to evaluate.

Reputation and Trust (30%)

The highest-weighted category. We evaluate BBB rating and accreditation status, Trustpilot score and review volume, Google review score, complaint history and density, regulatory actions or lawsuits, years in business, and industry recognition. A dealer with an A+ BBB rating, thousands of positive reviews, and no regulatory actions will score well. A dealer with documented complaints, regulatory settlements, or revoked accreditation will score poorly.

Pricing and Premiums (25%)

We score pricing based on premiums over spot on three benchmark products: the 1 oz American Gold Eagle (most liquid gold coin), the 1 oz American Silver Eagle (most liquid silver coin), and the 1 oz generic gold bar (lowest-premium gold product). We compare each dealer's premium to the average across all reviewed dealers. Below-average premiums earn higher scores. Above-average premiums earn lower scores. We also factor in payment method discounts, credit card surcharges, and volume pricing.

Transparency (15%)

This category uses binary tests. Can you see prices without calling? Yes starts at 4.0 minimum. No caps at 2.5 maximum. Is the full product catalog visible online? Yes adds 0.5. No subtracts 0.5. Are all fees disclosed before checkout? Yes adds 0.5. No subtracts 0.5. We also evaluate buyback price visibility, shipping cost clarity, and whether educational content is objective or thinly disguised sales material.

Service and Policies (20%)

We evaluate payment methods accepted (check, wire, credit card, crypto, ACH), shipping speed and insurance, free shipping threshold, buyback and return policies, customer service responsiveness across phone, chat, and email, and packaging quality. We contact each dealer's support team with standardized questions and document response times and accuracy.

Selection and Features (10%)

Product range across gold, silver, platinum, palladium, and rhodium. IRA services and custodian partnerships. Storage options. E-commerce functionality, account features, and tools. This category carries the lowest weight because most dealers cover the core products that matter to typical buyers. It rewards dealers that go further with specialty inventory, automated purchasing, or platform features.

We track premiums over spot on benchmark products (1 oz American Gold Eagle, 1 oz American Silver Eagle, 1 oz Canadian Gold Maple Leaf, 1 oz generic gold bar, 10 oz silver bar) using publicly available pricing from each dealer's own website. API-accessible dealers are polled every 15 minutes; dealers that require browser rendering are polled hourly. Both the latest snapshot and the underlying time series are retained so we can compute current spreads and, as history accumulates, rolling averages.

Pricing scores reflect the current premium snapshot at the time of the review. Once 30+ days of tracked history have accumulated, we will replace snapshot-based scores with rolling-window averages so individual scores reflect sustained positioning rather than a single-day reading.

We test customer service by contacting each dealer via phone, email, and live chat with standardized questions about products, shipping, and returns. We document response times, accuracy, and tone.

We aggregate public data from the BBB, Trustpilot, Google Reviews, and regulatory databases to evaluate reputation. All data points are verifiable through public sources.

Minted Metal has no affiliate, referral, or financial relationship with any precious metals dealer or Gold IRA company we review. Site revenue comes from affiliate partnerships in adjacent categories such as home safes, security systems, and insurance. Scores are calculated using the methodology on this page and are unaffected by any commercial relationship.