Wire Gauge Standards Information

Please note that the information here is only a guide for jewellery wire but may also be relevant to other industries.  

Gauge refers to the width of the jewellery wire.  The bigger the gauge number, the thinner the jewellery wire, so 8ga is thick, and 30ga is thin. 

There are two Jewellery wire gauge standards available:

1.  The American standard - referred to as AWG (American Wire Gauge) and

2.  The European standard - referred to as SWG (Standard Wire Gauge).

This site uses the AWG for ALL the wire gauge references. Other retail outlets may not tell you which standard they use, so find the exact wire measurement.   Below is a table you can use to find a gauge size, convert from inches to millimetres (mm) and find an equivalent gauge size between standards.

All information on this site uses the AWG standard, and each wire product has the millimetre size and gauge listed; click on the photo to see the details table.

Converting between Inches and Millimetres

Here are the base measurements for converting feet to metres and inches to millimetres.

25.4 mm = 1 inch
30.48cm = 1 foot
1 m = 3.3 feet

Wire Gauge Conversion Table

Please remember that this is a guide only.

Wire Tolerance

There is a tolerance to consider with wire sizing. All wire is manufactured, so where it is made, and the production quality can affect its thickness. A tolerance of 10% is considered acceptable. However, the better the production quality, the smaller this tolerance usually is. From my experience, precious metals are usually very accurate; natural metals (uncoated) are also accurate, and larger tolerances are more likely to be achieved with coated wires.

As an example of the impact of a tolerance, consider an 18ga wire (1.02mm); the wire may be just less (0.96mm, for example) or just a little thicker (1.1mm), which is acceptable.

Wire by Weight

Wire can be sold by weight, which is a little daunting initially. The wire is sold by the length on this site to make it easy and convenient.

Below are two tables that summarise the most common jewellery wire gauges available for Sterling Silver wire and Gold Filled wire and how many feet (Ft) and metres (M) you are in a troy ounce (Toz). The weight is shown in American troy ounces and shows the details for Round, Half Round and Square shaped wire.

1 Ounce = 28 grams
1 Troy Ounce = 31 grams

Gold Filled Wire Weight Per Toz

Please remember that this is a guide only.

Sterling Silver Wire Weight Per Toz

Please remember that this is a guide only.