Jake Storrie from Qasino Jewellery Talks Topaz. Is It Real?

As some of you may know, Topaz is the birthstone of November. With November just around the corner, people will be buying Topaz jewellery for birthday presents and such. But how can you know if your Topaz is real? Before we get into this, full disclosure: no home test is 100% accurate and the only guaranteed way to tell the difference is through lab testing. I can not be held responsible for any bad transactions that come about from reading this post. Furthermore, I cannot be held liable for any damages to property caused by carrying out these home tests, you do them at your own risk.

To begin we must first understand what kind of stones you could potentially be given and why. Treated amethyst, citrine, regular quartz and even glass are all examples of cheaper stones that can look very similar if not the same to the human eye as Topaz. To save time and make this explanation easier, amethyst and citrine are both varieties of quartz, so when I say quartz, I’m referring to all types of quartz.

So how can you tell the difference without paying a jeweller or a gemmologist? You’ll be glad to know that it’s not too difficult to tell glass from Topaz, however this method is not guaranteed, especially for smaller stones. Topaz is a conductor. With this in mind, a simple test is to rub your stone against a woollen cloth and see if it attracts hair or paper. If it does, you can be reasonably confident that your stone is genuine. Another way to tell is by the way the stone feels, Topaz is cool to touch and as smooth as silk. You might be thinking “well so is glass” and you’d be right! But if you have both together there is a slight difference in feel and texture. You might be asking why this is. Well without getting into a physics discussion. generally speaking, amorphous substances like glass conduct heat worse than crystalline substances like Topaz.

Quartz and Topaz on the other hand are easier to tell apart but may come with an undesirable outcome. A simple scratch test will give you the result instantly. All you need to do is scratch your phone screen with your stone. The glass on a standard phone screen is tempered these days and has a hardness rating of around 7, the same as quartz, so when you try to scratch it with quartz: nothing will happen. However, because Topaz has a hardness rating of 8 it will scratch all types of standard and tempered glass (I have tested this myself on a Samsung galaxy S6). The only problem with this method is that you are going to damage either the stone or the surface you are scratching.

All this being said, the safest and best way to test your topaz is by taking it to a professional jeweller or gemmologist to do things like refraction tests. Or to buy them from reputable reliable sellers. I hope this information has been helpful or interesting.

Post by Jake Storrie IG - @qasinojewellery