The time of the penny is coming to a close.
The U.S. Treasury Department placed its last order of blanks, flat metal discs used to make pennies, in late May. President Donald Trump told the mint to stop making pennies back in February, calling the 1-cent coin that costs 3.69 cents to make “wasteful”.
Prices everywhere will likely start being rounded up to 5-cent increments to match the new lowest value coin in circulation, the nickel. Nickels cost the U.S. government 13.78 cents to make, USA TODAY previously reported.
With the penny coin going bye-bye, here’s what you need to know about the ones you have left.
Will pennies become more valuable?
Probably not.
The mint made around 3.2 billion pennies in 2024, so they’re not exactly rare, USA TODAY previously reported.
“There’s nothing, statistically, that says they should become valuable,” John Feigenbaum, publisher of rare coin price guide Greysheet and executive director of the Professional Numismatists Guild (PNG), a nonprofit organization composed of many of the nation’s rare coin experts, told USA TODAY.
Feigenbaum said there’s no reason to horde even pennies from the last batch minted in 2025. They’re not going to be more valuable, he said.
Are there any pennies worth millions?
There are pennies worth over $1 million, but you probably don’t have one, according to experts.
The most valuable pennies are copper “Lincoln wheat pennies” that were accidentally minted in 1943 during World War 2, when the mints were supposed to be saving zinc for the war effort, USA TODAY previously reported.
Some of these pennies have sold for over $1 million. But, they’re likely only worth between $100,000 to $250,000, Feigenbaum told USA TODAY.
Only 27 of these ultra-rare coins from 1943 are thought to have survived, according to APMEX. There are around 240 billion pennies in circulation in the U.S. currently, so the chances of any given penny being one of these valuable coins is around 1 in 8.8 billion. That’s a lot of smashed piggy banks.
Are any pennies worth keeping?
“Wheat pennies” produced from 1909 to 1958 might be worth keeping. At the very least, some of them might be worth more than one cent, and some of them may even be worth hundreds of dollars, according to the Numismatic Guaranty Company, an international coin grading service.
These coins have stalks of wheat encircling the “One Cent” text on the back of the coin. The wheat was eventually phased out and replaced with an engraving of the Lincoln Memorial, USA TODAY reported.
What should you do if you think your coins are valuable?
There are a few steps you can take if you find a coin that makes dollar signs flash in your eyes.
USA TODAY reporters Mike Snider and Daniel de Visé contributed to this report.
Breaking and Trending News Reporter Nathan Hart can be reached at NHart@dispatch.com and at @NathanRHart on X and at nathanhart.dispatch.com on Bluesky.
This article originally appeared on The Columbus Dispatch: The penny is going away. Should you smash your piggy bank looking for rare ones?
Reporting by Nathan Hart, Columbus Dispatch / The Columbus Dispatch
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