Meteorite Market Report 2025

It’s been three years since I wrote the previous installment of my “Meteorite Market Analysis 2022” and I wanted to revisit some of my conclusions and see how well they have aged. In that report, I interviewed some other meteorite dealers to get a wider feel for the market as a whole and not just my limited bubble of sources and associates. In this installment, it is just me and you the reader, so let’s get started…

To recap from 2022 : The Chinese had entered the market in force. Moldavite and iron meteorites had skyrocketed in price. The premium for new falls continued to climb faster than the stones were falling. Along with new falls, moldavite, and irons, the prices on quality unclassified stones continued to rise as supply dwindled. There were a few areas where prices defied the upward trend. Planetaries, Vestans, and other “rare types” are not so “rare” now. Every week there are more lunars, Martians, and Vestans being recovered and classified at a pace that is outstripping demand. While getting a new fall or iron has gotten a lot more expensive, obtaining a piece of the Moon, Mars, or Vesta has become a lot more affordable. Lastly, eBay and social media’s status as major meteorite marketplaces continued to dwindle as fraud became more rampant.

So, where do we stand now in 2025?

Well, in whole, my analysis and predictions have held up pretty well. This isn’t some occasion to pat myself on the back, and I would have loved to be proven wrong on some of the things I said, like the decline of eBay and China flooding the market. But, there is some nuance to talk about, because nothing is ever simple when it comes to meteorites.

Irons : The prices on irons continues to climb. I’m regularly seeing run of the mill Campo del Cielo irons going for $1000 per kilogram. Frankly, this seems absolutely nuts to this old timer. I remember paying $100 per kilo as recently as 2015-ish and usually around $250 per kilo just five years ago when the pandemic started. I don’t foresee a time when the prices on irons are going to come back down. If you want a decent-sized iron, I wouldn’t wait too much longer. The supply of known irons like Campo, Diablo, Gibeon, and Sikhote are dwindling and the prices continue to skyrocket. New iron recoveries are quite rare, so it’s not a situation like planetaries where new NWA finds are going to pile up and overpower the demand from collectors.

New falls : still expensive and getting more expensive. A recent June fall in Georgia was being offered for over $200 per gram, despite it being an unremarkable ordinary chondrite. This is not an anomaly of one or two rogue dealers just pulling prices out of thin air. Unfortunately for collectors, this has become a new market benchmark for fresh falls. Wholesale deals aren’t much better, even if you can find one (which is usually not possible with brand new falls). This is why you don’t see me scrambling to offer new falls any more. How the heck am I supposed to make a profit on an ordinary chondrite that I paid $250 per gram for? I paid $50/gram for premium-grade Chelyabinsk two weeks after the fall. Are we supposed to believe that this new fall in Georgia is five times better and more desirable than Chelyabinsk? I call horseshit and dealer greed on this one. You can’t look me in the eye with a straight face and tell me that it now costs a hunter-dealer more money to chase a fall in Georgia USA than it did on the other side of the planet in Russia. Costs and expenses have gone up, but not that much for chrissakes. This is just greed. I call it the way I see it.

Planetaries : the prices continue to drop, which is great news for collectors. We aren’t in the bargain basement yet, and prices seem to have stabilized, but lunars and Martians are still a good deal. The rate of price decline has slowed down, but planetaries remain one of the best bargains on the planet right now. Not every dealer has gotten the memo about prices, and there are some outliers trying to charge 2015 prices for lunars and Martians. I would guess those dealers aren’t having much luck moving their rocks when compared to their competition who are racing to the bottom with pricing.

On a side note, a big Martian rock recently sold at a Sotheby’s auction for $5.3 million dollars. The marketing gimmick on this one was it’s temporary status as the world’s largest single Martian meteorite. Typically, large meteorites sell at a substantial per-gram price discount, but this lucky buyer paid full market value for every gram of their 54-pound rock. Doing some rough math, that is approximately $220 per gram, which is just about the typical retail price for an otherwise-unremarkable NWA Martian find. This doesn’t factor in the buyer’s premium, freight, and insurance. How long will this stone remain the largest? Who knows. It could be a week or year, but another Martian that is even bigger will come out of the desert – it’s only a matter of time. So, congratulations to the Sotheby’s buyer who paid through the nose for an overhyped NWA Martian that comes with temporary bragging rights. Once it becomes the second largest (or third or fourteenth), it’s market value will regress to normal and the buyer will have a sizeable loss for a tax write-off later.

Moldavite and “Cintamani” : Moldavite is still the darling of the TikTok crowd, so the price is still sky high and will remain that way due to dwindling supply. I don’t expect any change in the Moldavite market – the prices will continue to creep up.

While we are talking about impact glasses, I want to mention something that is recently flooding the market : the so-called “Saffordite” or “Cintamani” specimens that are popping up all over the web and social media. Don’t be fooled. I strongly suspect that much of this new wave of Cintamani and Saffordite that is coming out of China is fake. It was pointed out to me that these specimens are being offered all over the big Chinese venues like Temu and Shein (another red flag). I know meteorite hunters who hunt the region where genuine Saffordite is found. They tell me it is extremely rare to find a single small specimen, less yet thousands of sizeable pieces that are appearing on the market suddenly. This is highly suspicious. I know hunters who have spent decades scouring the land for these things and they have never found a single one during their meteorite hunts. It is impossible that the Chinese have found a secret legitimate source for this bounty of new material. Just like their abundant fake fossils, fake meteorites, fake crystals, fake gemstones, fake Moldavite, and fake amber, you can now add bogus Cintamani/Saffordite to the list. Save your money. I wouldn’t touch it with a ten foot pole. If you do get offered some, press for provenance details. I inquired with one seller who reluctantly admitted the material was purchased out of China, yet they insisted it originally came from the desert southwest USA. I call bullshit. And yes, both terms seemed to be used interchangeably now, although both originally applied to different things. If you must purchase a piece of this material, make sure you get it from a well-known and knowledgeable meteorite or tektite dealer. Don’t go get it from some random rock or crystal dealer on Facebook.

Google Lens, Chat-GPT, and the Artificial Dumbass : I’m just going to come out and say it. I think consumer “artificial intelligence” is a marketing gimmick to fleece venture capitalists out of their investments. It’s not ready for primetime. It confidently spits out wrong answers and it misleads people into thinking the rock they found in a ditch behind their house is a meteorite. I have written about this problem before and it continues to grow and become a bigger issue that is negatively impacting the integrity of the meteorite market. Online venues are overrun with misidentified meteorwrongs being offered by clueless sellers or scammers who absolutely know better and don’t care. To emphasize again to anyone who missed the memo the first time around – steer clear of any “meteorite” being offered on the basis of an identification made by AI or some dude named Josh who used AI.

Bonus AI points : I don’t know of a single legit dealer who uses AI to write their specimen descriptions, auction listings, or social media posts regarding meteorites. Seeing some clown using generative AI to hock their rocks is amateur hour and a big red flag. Even if the photo of the rock looks like a meteorite, I’d avoid it if any part of the `offer or sales pitch is tainted by AI.

The Mercury meteorite : three more years and still no meteorite from Mercury. It doesn’t stop speculative dealers from offering them though. I’ve seen one or two more since the last market report. Any claim about a meteorite’s parent body should be accompanied by solid scientific research and not some wild speculation based loosely on a single academic paper. When a meteorite from Mercury is confirmed, it will be published in the Journal of Meteoritics and Planetary Science (MAPS) and not on some rando’s social media page.

At the risk of coming across like a bitter old geezer shaking his fist at the clouds, I have to say that some elements of the meteorite market continue to move in the wrong direction of profiteering and sensational claims. It’s getting more difficult for rank and file collectors to get good deals or discern what is real and what is not. So, with all of this complaining and bad news, are there any parts of meteorite market that are in good shape? Well yes, there is. Let’s talk about the good old boring NWA chondrite.

Looking for deals in the NWA Bargain Bin : one of the few areas where good deals can still be found are our old friends the NWA chondrites. I don’t mean the new planetaries or Vestans. I am referring to the golden oldies and greatest hits : NWA 869, NWA 4528, NWA 6080, and common H5 and L6 type of stones. This also applies to obscure Saharans like Jiddat al Harasis and OC’s out of the Dhofar region of Oman. Those unsexy, browned, mildly-sandblasted, and moderately-weathered stones now pack good bang for the buck. Penny for penny, NWA 869 remains one of the prettiest stones on the market when properly sliced and polished. You can still find it for a buck a gram. If NWA 869 had just fallen last week in Ohio, it would cost $500 per gram just based on how pretty the matrix is. No kidding. I’m exaggerating a little, but the point is valid. While the market is going ga-ga over sexy new achondrites, pallasites, and planetaries, the budget-minded collector can get sizeable hand specimens of these golden oldies for a pittance in comparison. What would you rather have? A postage-stamped sized part slice of a “Possible Mercury Meteorite!” for $250, or a beautiful whole stone of NWA 869 the size of a grapefruit for the same money? I know where I’m putting my cash. I had stopped acquiring these types of stones for a long time, but as market forces evolve, I find myself being drawn back to them. I will be offering more of these types of specimens in the future.

In summary, the general overall direction of prices in the meteorite market is upwards and will continue to move up for the near to mid-term future. Barring some national economic meltdown (which isn’t impossible), meteorites will remain a good investment for collectors as long as they are savvy about exactly which meteorites they buy. I’d steer clear of larger planetaries until the prices finally stabilize – don’t be that person who grossly overpaid just to get a temporary feel good. Compared to many other collectibles, meteorites are still a safe bet. Imagine if you had socked a ton of money into Beanie Babies or Pokemon cards – what would that investment look like right now? Not very good. And, if worst comes to worst and we experience a total economic collapse, then not all is lost. Put your meteorites into a tube sock and now you have a melee weapon to clobber an assailant over the head. Try that with a stack of Pokemon cards.

Until next time!