What Are Silver Bars?

Weight

• Silver bars are measured in troy ounces. Bars that weigh one troy ounce or less are often referred to as ingots. Silver ingots are most commonly one troy ounce, though it is not difficult to find silver ingots that weight a half or a quarter of a troy ounce.
  
  Silver bars can be manufactured in any size, but the most common sizes are one troy ounce, ten troy ounces, 100 troy ounces and 1,000 troy ounces, because of the ease of counting and determining the value of the silver bars.
  
  

Investment Grade

• When most people talk about silver bars, they are referring to bars that contains 99.9 percent silver. This is most commonly stated as ".999" purity and is known as "investment grade" silver. Most people buying for investment will only purchase silver bars that have ".999 fine silver" stamped on the bar.
  
  

Art Bars

• Art bars are silver bars that have a design etched or engraved into them, generating niche collector value. For example, art bars can be produced for a sports championship, a commemoration of an event, or any other design that might interest collectors. Often times, art bars will be valued at a premium over the metal price of the silver bar, depending on the popularity of the design.
  
  

Other Purities

• Many bars are marked "925," meaning they are sterling silver bars. Sterling silver is 92.5 percent silver. Often silver art bars will be produced in sterling silver to keep costs down for those who are not interested in investing.
  
  Homemade silver bars are bars that people make by melting silver coins or jewelry and then construct a bar from it. These bars are usually very rough in shape and design, in contrast to those produced by professional mints. Homemade bars are not certified as containing a certain purity of silver.
  
  

Value

• A silver bar that weighs one troy ounce and is .999 pure will always be valued at the spot price of silver. The spot price of silver is the current value at which a troy ounce of silver is trading on any given day. You can then multiply the current spot price by the number of troy ounces of silver you have, if the silver bar is more than one troy ounce. Calculate the price of one troy ounce of sterling silver by taking 92.5 percent of the current spot price of silver.