Gold Price Chart: 50 and 100 Years

By the Gold Spot Market editorial team · Updated November 11, 2026

Prices on this page as of November 11, 2026 at 20:23 UTC (spot quote from gold-api.com).

Quick answer: Fifty years ago, in 1975, gold averaged $161.43 per troy ounce. A century ago, in 1925, the average was $20.65. In 2025, the last complete year, it averaged $3,466.09, a change of +2,047% over fifty years and +16,685% over a hundred. The live spot price today is $3,987.20 per ounce.

Gold price chart: 20, 50 and 100+ years

20 years50 yearsSince 1900Since 1900, 1998 dollars

One point per year: USGS Data Series 140 unit values before 2001, then an average of every daily COMEX futures settlement, with 2026 counted to date. The inflation-adjusted view uses the USGS column in 1998 dollars, which stops at 2022. Where USGS and the futures averages cover the same years, they never differ by more than 0.5%.

The chart has three ranges. 20Y and 50Y show recent decades on an ordinary scale. Since 1900 switches to a log scale, so that, for example, a move from $20 to $40 takes the same height as a move from $2,000 to $4,000; on a plain scale the first seventy years would flatten into a line along the floor. A second toggle swaps the nominal line for one in 1998 dollars, which runs to 2022 and is explained further down. For the daily number behind the right-hand edge, see the gold spot market price page.

How the long series is built

Two sources are stitched together. From 1900 to 2022, each point is the US Geological Survey's annual figure for gold from its Data Series 140. From 2001 onward, each year is the average of that year's daily closes for COMEX gold futures in our price feed. The two overlap for more than twenty years, and across that overlap the largest gap between them is 0.5%, so the chart marks the seam but the join barely shows. The current year is labelled "year to date" because it is still filling in.

The USGS number is not a market quote. The agency defines its unit value as the price, in dollars, of a metric ton of apparent consumption. Where a commodity comes in several forms, USGS weights each form's price by its share of consumption, and where no price series exists it builds the value from export, import and production data. We convert the ton figure to troy ounces.

That definition explains a puzzle on the chart. Under the Gold Act of 1900, the dollar was defined at $20.67 per ounce, yet the USGS figure for 1900 reads $18.94. An annual unit value of consumed gold can sit a little away from an official price, and the USGS landing page does not say which price series feeds its gold figure. Treat the early years as a good guide to the level, not as the exact fixed rate. For how today's quote is formed, read what the spot price of gold is.

The episodes you can see on the chart

1834 to 1933: the long flat line

For most of a century the line barely moves, because the price was set by law. A 1980 Cleveland Fed commentary put gold at $20.67 per ounce for most of the period from 1834 to 1933. The Federal Reserve's history essays describe the US as on a de facto gold standard from the 1830s and a legal one from 1900, and the 1913 law that created the Fed required dollars to be convertible at that fixed rate. On our series, 1920 averages $20.53.

1933: the gold order

Executive Order 6102, dated April 5, 1933, required people to hand in gold coin, bullion and gold certificates to a Federal Reserve Bank by May 1, 1933. It exempted up to $100 per person in coin and certificates, gold used in industry, a profession or art, and coins of special value to collectors. Breaking it could bring a fine of up to $10,000, prison for up to ten years, or both. On April 20, Roosevelt issued a proclamation that formally suspended the gold standard. The $20.67 rate had held until that spring, and the 1933 average on our chart, $26.34, already sits above it.

1934: the revaluation

Roosevelt signed the Gold Reserve Act on January 30, 1934, and gold was then valued at $35 per ounce. The Fed's essay notes that this cut the dollar's gold value to 59 percent of its 1900 level. The step on the chart from $26.34 to $34.84 is that revaluation.

1944 to 1971: Bretton Woods and the closing of the window

At the Bretton Woods conference in July 1944 the dollar was fixed to gold at $35 an ounce. The IMF notes that only central banks could still redeem dollars at that fixed rate. A gold pool formed in 1961 sold metal if strong demand threatened to push up the open-market price. That pool collapsed in March 1968, and the IMF says the US stopped redeeming privately held dollars for gold that year. On the evening of August 15, 1971, Nixon announced that the gold window was closed, and foreign governments could no longer swap dollars for gold. The Smithsonian Agreement that December set a new official rate of $38, and a further devaluation in February 1973 moved it to $42. Our averages show the start of the change: $36.39 in 1970 and $41.37 in 1971.

1974: Americans may own gold again

Public Law 93-373, approved August 14, 1974, let US citizens buy, hold and sell gold. Its key section took effect on December 31, 1974, or earlier on a presidential finding, and Executive Order 11825 of that date revoked the old gold orders. By then the price had already left the official rate far behind: the 1974 average on our chart is $159.87, and 1975, the start of the fifty-year view, averaged $161.43. The lowest yearly average since then was in 1976, at $125.35.

1980: a peak with several numbers

The late-1970s climb came in steps. The Cleveland Fed listed gold first reaching $100 in May 1973, $200 in July 1978, $300 in July 1979 and $800 in January 1980. The top itself has more than one figure, depending on where and how it was measured:

• The Cleveland Fed, writing on January 28, 1980, said gold sold in London for $835 on January 18.
• HM Treasury, in a 2019 letter, referred to a high of $850 per ounce in January 1980.
• Numismatic News gave $875 as the New York record trading price on January 21, 1980, with a close of $825 that day.

Look at the 1980 average on our chart, $612.74, and you will see how far below any of those peaks a full year can land. A few frantic weeks in January are averaged with eleven calmer months.

1999: the low and the UK auctions

On 7 May 1999, HM Treasury announced plans to cut UK gold holdings from about 715 tonnes to about 300 tonnes over the medium term. It sold 395 tonnes at 17 auctions between July 1999 and March 2002, at a weighted average of $274.92 per ounce by the Treasury's count; a Hansard written answer gives $274.95. On 26 September 1999, the ECB and fourteen European central banks issued a joint statement on gold, capping sales at about 400 tons a year and 2,000 tons over five years. The Bank of England says the London morning fixing ranged from $252.90 to $326.25 during the auctions; the bottom of that range is the dip some commentators nicknamed "Brown's Bottom". Our averages read $279.93 for 1999 and $271.04 for 2001.

2011 and 2015: a peak and a long slide

Reuters reported spot gold at a record above $1,920 on September 6, 2011; the same report gave a US gold record of $1,923.2 without naming the contract. By December 2015, Reuters had spot at $1,045.85, its lowest since February 2010, with US futures at $1,045.40. On December 17, the day after the Fed's first rate rise, the London PM fix was $1,049.40. Our yearly averages are $1,572.14 for 2011 and $1,158.84 for 2015.

2020: a new nominal high

Spot gold rose to $2,000.58 on August 4, 2020. The Perth Mint says gold closed above $2,000 for the first time on 5 August. On August 6, the London PM price was $2,067.15 and COMEX December futures settled at a record $2,069.40. The year averaged $1,776.81 on our series.

2026: the newest record

This site's record is the highest daily high of COMEX gold futures in its feed: $5,586.20 on January 29, 2026. Other series printed other peaks, including a record of US$5,307 on the LBMA Gold Price PM on January 28. Futures now sit 28.5% below our record, and the year-to-date average is $4,501.03. The page on why the gold price is dropping dates each step of the fall.

Every year since 1900

Each row is generated from the joined series: the year, the average price per ounce, the change from the year before, and a short note on about fifteen of the years. Nothing in the table is typed by hand. The highest annual average so far is 2025, at $3,466.09.

Gold price in 1980: the year averaged $612.74 per ounce on our series, far below the January peaks quoted above.

Gold price in 2000: the year averaged $280.24, close to the bottom of the long 1980s and 1990s slide.

Gold price in 2020: the year averaged $1,776.81, the year spot first crossed two thousand dollars.

Nominal dollars and 1998 dollars

A dollar in 1900 bought far more than a dollar does now, so a nominal chart flatters recent prices. The 1998-dollar toggle uses USGS's own constant-dollar column, which the agency deflates with the Consumer Price Index for All Urban Consumers. We use that column as published and do not extend it with an inflation series of our own, so the real-terms line stops at 2022. Read in 1998 dollars, the 1980 peak stands much taller against later decades than it does on the nominal line.

What the long view can and can't tell you

A century of averages shows how gold behaved through a fixed price, a revaluation, the end of convertibility and several booms and busts. It can't tell you what the next decade holds, and a long-run gain over fifty years says nothing about any single year inside it. Starting points matter too: measured from a peak year, a long period can look flat; measured from a trough, the same years can look spectacular.

To read shorter moves, with candles, ranges and volatility, see how to read a gold spot chart. To put the price in context of size, the gold market cap page multiplies the above-ground stock by today's spot, and gold reserves by country shows how much of that stock sits with central banks. You can return to the live spot chart at any time.

Information, not financial advice. This page does not tell you to buy or sell, and it does not forecast prices. Figures are reference values at the time shown.

Long charts tend to come up when people plan retirement savings. If physical gold in an IRA is part of that plan for you, read our page on Augusta Precious Metals, the single partner of this site, before you request anything; it notes the kind of buyer Augusta does not fit.

Frequently asked questions

Sources

Every page a fact on this page came from, marked as the publisher's own page or a page that reports it, with the date we read it.

• usgs.gov (usgs.gov; the publisher's own page; read 2026-11-11)
• federalreservehistory.org (federalreservehistory.org; the publisher's own page; read 2026-11-11)
• clevelandfed.org (clevelandfed.org; the publisher's own page; read 2026-11-11)
• federalreservehistory.org (federalreservehistory.org; the publisher's own page; read 2026-11-11)
• presidency.ucsb.edu (presidency.ucsb.edu; the publisher's own page; read 2026-11-11)
• imf.org (imf.org; the publisher's own page; read 2026-11-11)
• federalreservehistory.org (federalreservehistory.org; the publisher's own page; read 2026-11-11)
• govinfo.gov (govinfo.gov; the publisher's own page; read 2026-11-11)
• archives.gov (archives.gov; the publisher's own page; read 2026-11-11)
• assets.publishing.service.gov.uk (assets.publishing.service.gov.uk; the publisher's own page; read 2026-11-11)
• bankofengland.co.uk (bankofengland.co.uk; the publisher's own page; read 2026-11-11)
• api.parliament.uk (api.parliament.uk; the publisher's own page; read 2026-11-11)
• ecb.europa.eu (ecb.europa.eu; the publisher's own page; read 2026-11-11)
• foxbusiness.com (foxbusiness.com; a page reporting it; read 2026-11-11)
• thehimalayantimes.com (thehimalayantimes.com; a page reporting it; read 2026-11-11)
• coinnews.net (coinnews.net; a page reporting it; read 2026-11-11)
• aljazeera.com (aljazeera.com; a page reporting it; read 2026-11-11)
• perthmint.com (perthmint.com; a page reporting it; read 2026-11-11)
• coinnews.net (coinnews.net; a page reporting it; read 2026-11-11)
• gold.org (gold.org; the publisher's own page; read 2026-11-11)

Keep reading

• the 2026 fall: a dated timeline of the decline from January's record
• candlestick charts: how to read daily moves, ranges and volatility on a shorter chart
• how big the gold market is: the above-ground stock valued at today's spot