white gold
+harder
+cheaper
-need recoating
-britle - so easier to lose gem?
-scratch prone?

platinum
+more ductile/durable?
+no allergic reaction from nickel
+harder to lose the gem
-need polishing
-forms "patina"
-expensive

what say you?

I am going to buy couple ring for my gf and me, we both don't like to wear ring or feel uncomfortable to wear the ring with necklace.

Any suggestion？

mine is white gold. its lighter and i m a gentle user.
my husband's is platinum cos he is a rough user.

it really depends.

i nv liked to wear ring too before i got married. then i forced myself to wear daily. now i feel uncomfortable not wearing them. so its a matter of getting used to.

i upgraded my fiancee ring to platinum not because tough or not but because she got nickel allergy.

White gold some shop got mix with nickel and for sensitive people can cause allergy.

Platinum no reaction at all so very safe.

Tungsten

becareful, i hear that tungsten cannot resize in case your finger size change

Only cost less than 100ringgit.. can't resize, just buy another one lor

for symbolic reason most prople wont want to change their wedding or engagement ring so easily

i chose platinum.
but its much more expensive than white gold.
still, it's for a lifetime right?

I chose white gold over platinum when I bought our wedding bands from Love & Co. simply because white gold has that element of gold which really makes the ring more rigid.

You'd definitely want something more rigid if you are wearing them day and night because you are bound to knock onto something.

Correct me if I'm wrong but pure gold is quite soft & I don't think "rigid" is right word to describe. It's mixed with other metals to get stronger then become white gold etc. No pure gold is used to make diamond ring.

I think what the "rigid" means it is solid yet at the same time more brittle. And yes, you are right, white gold is mixed with other elements. In Malaysia, the usual white gold is 18k meaning it is 75% gold mixed with 25% other metals to form 18k white gold. There is 14k white gold too, meaning it has lesser gold content, around 58.5‰ or somewhere around there plus other metals. 14k is even more brittle but cheaper due to lesser gold.

While we can say brittle is easier to break, in reality, I have heard that platinum may loose the gem too. This is because it is more malleable (easier to bend) after mixing with other metals. While it is harder to break, it may change shape easier when apply the same force compared to white gold. So if somehow the force is apply onto the prongs and caused the gem to loosen up, it will drop too.

At the end of the day, the wearer should still be careful when wearing jewellery.

As for white gold can cause sensitivity, that is rather true if you have nickel content in the white gold alloy mix. A lot of vendors will tell you that they do not have and mixed with palladium (another precious metal in the same family as platinum) instead, but I have doubts about it. FYI, palladium is hypoallergenic, meaning it is highly unlikely to cause sensitivity. As for my doubts, no one so far has proven their white gold content as far as I know. I do know some small jeweller in the US does use white gold with palladium. In Europe, nickel-based white gold is illegal I think (could be wrong).

That being said, you can consider pure palladium too. I think some jewellers in Malaysia do that.

And just to update... Not many people are allergic to nickel-based white gold.

This post has been edited by kambingkoh: Jan 6 2020, 02:56 PM

pure "yellow" gold is softer than platinum, yes but not white gold. white gold is relatively "harder" if compared to platinum. the term "harder" in this context is to be taken to mean "resistance to scratch".

the reason why no one adorns a 3 carat, VVS1, D colored diamond on a gold ring is because it mismatch. diamonds reflect lights and having a gold ring will just make the diamond appear yellow.