Environment & Energy
How much gold is lost in e-waste every day?
E-waste is an urban mine. The 62 million tonnes generated in 2022 contained metals worth $91 billion, including $15 billion in gold, and $62 billion of recoverable resources went unaccounted for. Scaled to about 70 million tonnes in 2025, that is roughly 280 tonnes of gold. A tonne of old phones has many times more gold than a tonne of gold ore, which makes the recycling rate look even more wasteful: only 22.3% of e-waste reaches formal recyclers. Roughly 9 grams of gold enter the e-waste stream every second.
Roughly 32 kg every hour.
Source: UN Global E-waste Monitor 2024 (ITU/UNITAR), which values the gold in 2022's e-waste at USD 15 billion. Tonnage is our conversion at ~$60/g, scaled to 2025 with e-waste volume.
Last checked: 18 October 2026
What this means for you
A single smartphone contains about 0.034 grams of gold, worth a few dollars at current prices. That is not much. But a tonne of old smartphones contains roughly 200-400 grams of gold, which is many times more concentrated than a tonne of typical gold ore. At that density, the world's discarded electronics are, collectively, a significant mineral deposit. The term for extracting from it is "urban mining."
The barrier is not technical. Collecting, sorting, and processing small consumer electronics at the required scale is expensive, and for most of the industry's history, manufacturers were not required to pay for it. EU Extended Producer Responsibility laws now make electronics manufacturers fund collection and recycling, but most countries have no equivalent.
Old electronics have real material value. Before discarding any device, check whether your retailer or municipality has a takeback program. In many regions, one exists and is free to use.
Gold discarded vs. total e-waste generated, today
Gold, silver, and palladium are embedded in circuit boards, connectors, and contact plating. When devices are thrown away without formal recycling, those metals are mostly lost for good.
The numbers: gold and valuable metals in e-waste
UN GEM 2024: $62 billion of recoverable resources in 2022's e-waste went unaccounted for; 22.3% of the mass was formally collected and recycled
One tonne of discarded circuit boards contains 40-400x more gold per tonne than gold ore from typical mines
Only 1% of rare earth element demand is met through e-waste recycling, despite critical importance for renewables and EVs
UN GEM 2019: 53.6 Mt e-waste contained $57 billion in recoverable gold, silver, copper, and other precious materials
E-waste is growing 5x faster than documented e-waste recycling (GEM 2024)
Urban mining: why your old phone is more valuable than gold ore
The $62 billion urban mine
"Urban mine" is the term for recovering metals from discarded goods rather than virgin ore. E-waste is among the richest: a single metric tonne of smartphone circuit boards can yield roughly 200-400 grams of gold, compared to about 0.4-5 grams from typical gold ore. The UN Global E-waste Monitor 2024 valued the metals in 2022's global e-waste at $91 billion and found that $62 billion worth of recoverable resources went unaccounted for, more than the annual GDP of countries such as Bolivia or Paraguay. Only 22.3% of the e-waste mass was documented as formally collected and recycled; the rest was landfilled, burned or handled informally.
Informal recycling and its costs
Without formal infrastructure, informal recyclers recover gold and copper through open burning, acid baths, and manual dismantling, which exposes workers, including children, to lead, mercury, cadmium, and brominated flame retardants. A 2022 WHO report put the number of children involved in informal e-waste recycling globally at 18 million. The largest informal sites are in West Africa (notably Agbogbloshie in Ghana), South and Southeast Asia, and parts of China, where neither the workers nor the surrounding communities receive the health or economic benefits of the metals being extracted.
Urban mining output growth over time
Each tonne of discarded circuit boards contains 40-800 times more gold than a tonne of gold ore, yet the global e-waste recycling rate sits below 25%. The UN values the gold in 2022's e-waste at $15 billion, which is roughly 250 tonnes at 2022 prices. Scaled with the growth in e-waste volume (62 Mt in 2022, ~70 Mt in 2025), about 280 tonnes of gold enter the e-waste stream in 2025, tens of billions of dollars in recoverable value.
| Year | Rate (kg/s) | kg/day | Context |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | 0.0042 kg/s | 365 kg | E-waste growth baseline |
| 2019 | 0.0069 kg/s | 592 kg | Record e-waste year; $57B recoverable |
| 2022 | 0.0079 kg/s | 685 kg | $15B of gold in e-waste; only 22.3% formally recycled |
| 2025 (est.) | 0.0089 kg/s | 767 kg | Scaled with e-waste volume on UN GEM 2024's 2022→2030 path |
| 2030 (forecast) | 0.0105 kg/s | 904 kg | UN GEM 2024 e-waste volume forecast if current trends continue |
Key milestones in urban mining
- 2010UN estimates 33 Mt e-waste globally; Agbogbloshie (Ghana) emerges as world's largest informal e-waste site
- 2019UN GEM 2020: 53.6 Mt e-waste, a record high; $57B in recoverable materials; only 17.4% formally recycled
- 2021EU WEEE Directive target: 65% collection rate; actual EU rate ~42%, well below target
- 2022UN GEM 2024: 62 Mt e-waste; $62B recoverable; 22.3% recycled, a modest improvement but still far below need
- 2024UN GEM 2024 released: e-waste growing 5x faster than recycling; 82 Mt forecast by 2030
The economic case for urban mining
At $62B in recoverable materials from 2022's e-waste, the discarded resources exceed the annual GDP of Bolivia or Paraguay
The ~280 tonnes of gold in e-waste per year (2025 est.) are roughly three-quarters of the annual mine output of the world's largest gold producer (China, roughly 380 tonnes a year)
Roughly 9 grams of gold enter the e-waste stream every second, about half a kilogram every minute
What researchers have found on e-waste metal recovery
| Year | Finding | Value | Source |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2010 | UN: ~33 Mt e-waste globally; recoverable materials ~$30B; formal recycling rate ~15% | 33 Mt e-waste generated (2010) | ITU / UNITAR |
| 2016 | UN GEM 2016: 44.7 Mt e-waste; recoverable value ~$55B; formal recycling ~20% | 45 Mt e-waste generated (2016) | ITU / UNITAR |
| 2019 | UN GEM 2020: 53.6 Mt e-waste (record); $57B recoverable; 17.4% formally recycled | 54 Mt e-waste generated (2019) | ITU / UNITAR |
| 2022 | UN GEM 2024: 62 Mt e-waste; $62B recoverable; 22.3% formally recycled; 300K kg platinum-group metals recovered | 62 Mt e-waste generated (2022) | ITU / UNITAR |
| 2030 | UN GEM 2024 forecast: 82 Mt e-waste by 2030 without policy change; recovery rate must triple to meet UN SDGs | 82 Mt e-waste forecast (2030) | ITU / UNITAR |
Frequently asked questions
- How much gold is in global e-waste?
- The UN Global E-waste Monitor values the gold in 2022's e-waste at $15 billion, which is roughly 250 tonnes at 2022 prices. Scaled with e-waste volume, we estimate about 280 tonnes for 2025, contained in circuit boards, connectors, and contact plating. The UN does not publish a gold tonnage itself, so this is our conversion. The metals in 2022's e-waste were worth $91 billion in total, and $62 billion of recoverable resources went unaccounted for.
- Is it economical to recover gold from e-waste?
- Yes. Circuit boards and smartphones contain roughly 200-400 grams of gold per tonne (0.02-0.04%), at least 40 times more than typical gold ore (about 0.4-5 g/t), although the average over all e-waste is only about 4 g/t. Formal recyclers using hydrometallurgical or pyrometallurgical processes recover it profitably. The problem is that only 22.3% of global e-waste reaches formal recycling.
- What other valuable metals are in e-waste?
- Beyond gold, e-waste contains silver (about 0.02% by weight), palladium, platinum, cobalt from batteries, copper (around 3.4% of e-waste by weight, 2.1 Mt of 62 Mt), indium, tellurium, and rare earth elements. The metals in 2022's global e-waste were worth $91 billion according to the UN: copper $19 billion, iron $16 billion and gold $15 billion.
Cite this rate
AnythingCounter derived rate, last checked October 2026: about 0.009 kg per second (about 767 kg per day).
Method: Based on ITU / UNITAR 2024, converted to a per-second rate (daily total ÷ 86,400).
Suggested citation: AnythingCounter, "Gold thrown away with e-waste," October 2026, https://anythingcounter.com/ewaste-gold-per-day
Primary source: ITU / UNITAR.
How this number is calculated, and how much to trust it
The UN Global E-waste Monitor 2024 does not state gold in tonnes. It values the gold in 2022's e-waste (62 Mt) at USD 15 billion. At the 2022 gold price of roughly $60/g (~$1,870/oz), that is about 250 tonnes, or ~4 g of gold per tonne of e-waste. Assuming the same gold content per tonne, 2025 (~70 Mt, linear on the UN's 62 Mt → 82 Mt path) contains roughly 280 tonnes. Converting: 280,000 kg ÷ 31,536,000 seconds ≈ 0.00888 kg/sec = ~8.9 grams of gold discarded per second. At an illustrative ~$100/g (~$100,000/kg) that is about $890/second in gold value. The live counter shows cumulative kilograms of gold discarded today. A plausibility check: the UN says recycling avoided about 900 billion kg of mined ore, around a fifth of it thanks to gold, and mining one kg of gold takes about 3 million kg of ore. That implies roughly 60 tonnes of recovered gold, which fits a collection rate of 22.3% applied to ~250 tonnes. This is an AnythingCounter estimate, not a UN figure; gold content per device varies and the price assumption carries about ±10%.
Cross-checks come from the World Gold Council's annual e-waste supply report and studies in Resources, Conservation and Recycling (Elsevier). The UN reports the value of gold in 2022's e-waste (USD 15 billion), not a tonnage. The ~250 t (2022) and ~280 t (2025) are our own conversion at ~$60/g and scaled with total e-waste volume, not directly measured.
Sources: see below. More detail on our methodology page.
Sources
Worth a look... Total e-waste generated - Sand mined for devices - Data center energy.