IT’S worth having a dig around your loose change for any rare and valuable 50p coins.
The Royal Mint, the official maker of British coins, regularly puts limited edition pieces into general circulation.
In some cases, extremely rare 50p pieces have sold for a whopping £950.
So it’s worth rummaging through your purse or wallet to see if you got anything worth potentially hundreds of pounds.
You can figure out how rare a coin is, by checking its mintage figures.
This relates to how many coins were produced by The Royal Mint.
If a coin has a low mintage, it means there’s less in circulation and is therefore rarer and it could potentially be worth more than its face value.
Either way, you’ll want to keep an eye out for some in particular which can sell for big numbers.
Here are some rare and valuable 50p coins.
Kew Gardens is famous for its stunning gardens and scenery.
But despite the design, it’s not so easy to get a hold of this coin, of which there are just 210,000 in circulation.
We’ve seen the coin which was minted in 2009 sell for as much as £707 before on eBay.
However more recently it sold for £320 with 40 bids on October 13.
Minted in 2023, the Salmon 50p depicts a salmon fish jumping out of the Atlantic ocean and has King Charles III on the other side.
This makes The Atlantic Salmon coin the first to represent the Kings’ face.
There are only 200,000 of the coins in circulation, making this coin quite a rare find.
The Atlantic Salmon coin has been dubbed by the online coin site Copes Coins as one of the “most talked about coins in the coin community”, RedditchAdvisor reports.
The highest recent sale we’ve found on eBay recently was £120 on October 14 with 10 bids.
It also sold for £113 on this day with 11 bids.
The football coins are the rarest of all the Olympics 2012 coins, with just 1,125,500 in circulation.
The coin’s design shows a football pitch with a diagram explaining the “offside” rule.
One sold for £15 on eBay on July 25, although it has been known to go for as much as £75 in the past.
That is a good example of how a coin is only worth what someone is willing to pay.
The Peter Rabbit design originates from the famous children’s books by Beatrice Potter.
The coin was released in 2018 according to Change Checker.
We’ve seen it sell for as much as £26 online so is worth digging around for.
In recent months, one was also sold on eBay for £25 on October 13.
The shooting coin for the 2012 Olympics showed a figure firing their rifle into the sky.
Our research showed that one of the coins recently sold for £25 on eBay, despite it being lower down the pecking order than some other examples.
The coin was issued in 2018 to celebrate one of Beatrix Potter’s most loved children’s tales, “The Tale of Flopsy Bunny”.
There are 1,400,000 Flopsy Bunny 50ps in circulation according to Change Checker.
One sold for £16.50 on eBay with three bids on October 14.
That is 33 times its worth at a cashier if you weren’t to catch the design.
WE reveal the Royal Mint’s most rare and valuable 50p coins in circulation.
Triathlon
Minted in 2011, the Triathlon 50p depicts the same sport which featured in the 2012 Olympics.
There are more than 1,160,000 of the coins in circulation.
With over 200million 50ps circulating in the UK, that makes this coin quite a rare find.
The highest recent sale we’ve found on eBay recently was £30 on June 21.
Judo
Judo is a popular sport that involves grappling with your opponent.
But despite the design, it’s not so easy to get a hold of this coin, of which there are just 1,161,500 in circulation.
The piece was designed by David Cornell after he won a national competition.
It was minted in 2011 and the highest bid we’ve seen on eBay was for £17.95 on June 21.
Wrestling
Wrestling was one of the first Olympic sports so it’s not surprising that it features on one of the 50p pieces.
The 2011 coin was designed by Roderick Enriquez, a graphic designer from Hammersmith, London.
We’ve seen it sell for as much as £15 online so is worth digging around for.
In recent months, one was sold on eBay for £11.95 on June 18.
Football
Of all the coins created to commemorate the 2012 Olympic Games, the 50p Football is among the rarest.
It features an explanation of the controversial offside rule on it, with 1,125,000 produced.
One sold for £20 on eBay on June 11, although it has been known to go for as much as £75 in the past.
Kew Gardens
The Kew Gardens 50p is the rarest of all the 50p pieces, with only 210,000 in circulation.
They have been known to sell for as much as £895 on eBay before.
The design was created by Christopher Le Brun RA and features the famous Chinese Pagoda with a leafy chamber that twists around the tower.
The coin often sparks the interest of new coin collectors due to its rarity.
The highest sale we found in recent weeks was £142 on June 22 with 23 bids.
Rare coins have been known to sell for thousands of pounds in the past with collectors keen to snap them up.
A coin is considered rare usually if it falls into one of two categories – having a low mintage or being an “error” coin.
The mintage of a coin relates to how many of it were struck and put into general circulation.
If you’re lucky enough to pick up a rare coin in your spare change, it could go for hundreds of pounds depending on how rare it is.
You should check how much the coin is selling for on eBay.
Search the full name of the coin, select the “sold” listing and then toggle the search to “highest value”.
It will give you an idea of the amount of money that the coin is going for.
But remember, a buyer could always pull out so the coin may not have gone for the price it says it has.
And watch out for fakes too.
You can also use an online tool that gives you an estimate of how much it could be worth on eBay, as well as any other rare coins you have.
Coin Hunter gives you an estimated valuation of your coin based on the average of the most recent sales, as well as a range of how much you can expect it to fetch.
Plus Change Checker’s Scarcity Index will give you a good idea of how rare a coin is.
