How to Find the Value of Your Antiques for Free (2026)
Published 2026-05-22 · Antique Valuation · Antique Partner
Quick answer: 7 free ways to find out what your antiques are worth. Use eBay sold listings, Google Lens, auction house estimates, and more to get a real value before selling or donating.
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Antique Valuation
How to Find the Value of Your Antiques for Free: 7 Methods That Actually Work
By Nicolas
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May 22, 2026
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12 min read
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An estimated $84.4 trillion in assets is transferring between generations through 2045. Somewhere in that wave, there's a china cabinet, a box of old jewelry, and a painting nobody knows what to do with. Before you donate it all to Goodwill, it's worth spending 10 minutes to check. Because 89% of antiques appraise below $1,000, but the other 11% is where the surprises live.
You don't need to hire an appraiser to get a rough idea of what something is worth. There are free tools, communities, and databases that didn't exist five years ago. Here are the seven that actually work, ranked from fastest to most thorough.
1. Google Lens: 30 seconds, zero cost
Google Lens is built into every Android phone and available through the Google app on iPhone. Point your camera at an antique, tap the Lens icon, and it shows you visually similar items from across the web, including shopping results with prices.
It's best for identifying what something is, not what it's worth. In head-to-head testing against dedicated antique apps, Google Lens scored well for common items but only 2 out of 5 for maker's marks and porcelain backstamps. It also shows asking prices (what sellers hope to get), not sold prices (what buyers actually paid). Those are very different numbers.
Best for: A fast starting point. Snap a photo, get a name, then move to Method 2 for real pricing.
Pro tip: Photograph distinctive features (carvings, labels, stamps, hardware) rather than the whole item. Lens performs better with close-ups of unique details.
2. eBay sold listings: the gold standard
This is the single most reliable free method for determining what an antique is actually worth. Not what someone listed it for. Not what a price guide says. What a real buyer paid, in the last 90 days.
How to do it:
Desktop: Search for your item on eBay. On the results page, scroll down the left sidebar to "Show Only" and check "Sold Items." Prices in green are confirmed sales.
Mobile: Search for your item. Tap "Filter" at the top right, scroll to "Show More," and toggle "Sold Items" to on.
Find 3 to 5 recent sold listings that match your item in style, condition, and completeness. Use the median price, not the average, because outliers skew averages.
The Best Offer problem: When you see a strikethrough price on a sold listing, the seller accepted a lower Best Offer amount. Standard search won't show the actual accepted price. The typical acceptance is 15 to 25 percent below the listed price. For the real number, use eBay's Terapeak tool (free for any eBay seller, found in Seller Hub under the Research tab). Terapeak reveals actual accepted prices and goes back three years.
3. Free online price databases
There are several databases with millions of real auction results that you can search for free:
AntiquesNavigator is genuinely free. Millions of records with actual prices paid, no account required.
LiveAuctioneers has 29+ million hammer prices. Free account required, with a large volume of results searchable at no cost.
Invaluable aggregates results from smaller regional auction houses that other platforms miss. A free account gives you 12 months of data.
Kovels offers free registration that includes their marks identification tool for pottery, porcelain, and silver. The full price guide requires a subscription ($4.99/month), but many public libraries offer full Kovels access through the Libby app with a valid library card.
Replacements, Ltd. offers free pattern identification for china, crystal, silver, and collectibles. Submit photos and their research team (handling 3,000+ requests weekly) will identify your pattern within 3 to 5 business days.
The Marks Project is a free nonprofit database of American studio ceramic makers from 1945 to the present. Searchable marks, signatures, and backstamps.
What about WorthPoint? It's the industry gold standard with 545+ million records, but it's not free. There's a 7-day trial with 7 lookups, then it's $28.99/month. Worth it for serious dealers, but not necessary for a one-time check.
4. Reddit: real people, real answers
Reddit has surprisingly knowledgeable communities for antique identification and valuation:
r/whatsthisworth is dedicated to valuation questions. Post clear photos with measurements and any markings. Testing shows helpful responses on roughly 60% of posts.
r/Antiques has 280,000+ members and is the go-to for general identification and discussion.
r/whatisthisthing has 2.3 million members. It's identification only (not valuation), but knowing what something is is the first step to knowing what it's worth.
Etiquette: Include measurements, weight, any markings, and multiple clear photos. Mention your location since values vary regionally. Treat responses as informed opinions, not professional appraisals.
Best for: Items under $500 where paying for a professional appraisal doesn't make economic sense, or unusual items you can't find anywhere else.
5. Auction house free estimates
Several major auction houses offer free online estimates. You submit photos and a description, and their specialists respond with a preliminary value:
Heritage Auctions covers coins, comic books, sports memorabilia, fine art, and luxury items. Free submission, and items valued at $500+ may get an in-person appointment.
Sotheby's accepts free online submissions. Expect a 15 to 20 business day response time.
Christie's lets you submit up to 6 items at once. Response time is typically 3 to 4 weeks.
Bonhams spans 60+ categories and offers video calls in addition to online submissions.
Important caveat: These are consignment evaluations, not formal appraisals. Auction houses estimate what an item would sell for at auction, which is typically 20 to 40 percent below retail value. They'll also only respond if they're interested in selling your item. Still, a free estimate from Sotheby's is a useful data point even if you never consign.
6. Facebook groups
Facebook has active communities dedicated to antique identification and valuation. Some of the most useful:
Antiques & Collectibles - Values, Identification & More is one of the largest general groups for valuation questions.
Antiques Appraisal is run by a nationally ranked certified appraiser, which raises the quality of responses.
Specialist groups exist for nearly every category: typewriters, radios, sewing machines, tools, pottery, vintage clothing. The more specific the group, the more knowledgeable the members.
Quality varies by who happens to respond. Specialist groups consistently outperform general groups. Best for items in the $50 to $500 range where you need a quick gut check.
7. Walk into a local antique store
Sometimes the best tool is a conversation. Most antique dealers will give a free verbal opinion on what something is and what it might be worth. They see thousands of items every year and can often identify something in seconds that would take you hours to research online.
How to approach it: Bring 1 to 3 items. Ask if they have a moment to take a look. Don't bring a truckload. Seek out specialists: a jewelry dealer for jewelry, a furniture dealer for furniture. Their expertise in that category will be deeper than a generalist.
One caveat: If a dealer is interested in buying the piece, their estimate may lean conservative. There's nothing wrong with that, but it's worth getting a second opinion from a dealer who specializes in a different area or who you're not selling to.
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Know the difference: auction, retail, and insurance value
One of the most common sources of confusion is that the same item has different "values" depending on the context. According to Antiques Roadshow , there are three:
Value Type
What It Means
Example
Auction
Wholesale/trade price
$25,000
Retail
What a dealer would charge
$40,000
Insurance
Cost to replace at current retail
$50,000
eBay sold listings give you something close to auction/market value. Dealer prices in a shop are retail. Insurance appraisals are typically 40 to 60 percent above fair market value. If someone tells you their vase is "worth $5,000" based on an insurance appraisal, the actual selling price is probably $2,000 to $3,000.
5 mistakes that cost people money
Trusting asking prices instead of sold prices. An item listed on eBay for $800 that sits unsold for six months isn't worth $800. It's worth whatever a similar one actually sold for. Always check sold listings, never active listings.
Assuming old means valuable. According to an analysis of 86,000+ real appraisals , condition impacts value 2 to 3 times more than age. A 50-year-old item in excellent condition regularly outvalues a 200-year-old item in fair condition.
Over-cleaning or refinishing. Aggressively polishing silver, sanding wood, or scrubbing away patina can slash value by 50% or more. Collectors prize originality. If you're unsure, do nothing until you've had it evaluated.
Using insurance appraisals as selling prices. Insurance values are intentionally inflated to cover replacement costs. Trying to sell at insurance value will price you out of the market.
Relying on a single source. No single app, database, or person gives the complete picture. The recommended workflow: use Google Lens or an AI app for identification (30 seconds), check eBay sold listings for pricing (2 minutes), then confirm with a second source like an auction database or a knowledgeable community.
A note on AI antique apps
Apps like Curio, Underpriced AI, and Antique Identifier have gotten a lot of attention. They let you photograph an item and get an instant identification and value estimate. But they come with caveats worth knowing.
Curio gives you 3 free scans, then charges $7/week. Its values are based on asking prices rather than sold prices, which means estimates tend to run high. Users have reported getting different results from the same photo, suggesting the AI is less consistent than it appears.
Underpriced AI is more useful for pricing because it pulls actual sold data from eBay, Etsy, Mercari, and other platforms. But it's also not truly free beyond a few trial scans ($12/month after that).
The bottom line: AI apps are good at giving you a name for something you can't identify. They're less reliable for actual pricing. Always cross-reference with eBay sold listings before making decisions based on an app's estimate.
When to stop DIY and hire a professional
Free methods get you 90% of the way for 90% of items. But there are situations where paying for a professional appraiser is the right call:
Legal requirements. Estate tax filings, divorce proceedings, donation deductions, and insurance claims all require professional appraisals. The IRS won't accept your eBay research.
Items potentially worth $500 or more. A professional appraisal costs $50 to $300 per item. If the item might be worth $500+, the cost pays for itself.
Multiple heirs inheriting one estate. A neutral third-party appraisal prevents family conflict over who gets what and whether the division is fair.
You can't find any comparable sales anywhere. If eBay, LiveAuctioneers, and Google all come up empty, the item may be rare enough to warrant professional evaluation.
Professional appraisers typically charge $100 to $350 per hour, or $250 to $350 for a first-item written appraisal with $25 to $100 for each additional item. Find certified appraisers through the International Society of Appraisers or the American Society of Appraisers . Never agree to a percentage-based fee. It incentivizes inflated valuations and is considered unethical in the profession.
The 3-step workflow
You don't need to use all seven methods. For most items, this three-step process takes less than five minutes:
1
Identify
Use Google Lens or an AI app to figure out what you have. 30 seconds.
2
Price
Check eBay sold listings for what buyers actually paid. 2 minutes.
3
Confirm
Cross-reference with an auction database, Reddit, or a local antique store. 2 minutes.
If the three-step check turns up something potentially valuable, go deeper with auction house estimates or a professional appraiser. If it doesn't, you can donate with confidence knowing you didn't give away a hidden treasure.
The real cost of not checking
The U.S. antiques and collectibles market is worth $65.2 billion and growing at 5.4% annually. Online antique sales alone are growing 18% year over year. There are buyers out there for things you might assume are worthless.
That estate business has tripled in the past five years as baby boomers downsize and heirs sort through decades of accumulated belongings. If you're one of those heirs, or if you stumbled onto something interesting at a thrift store or estate sale, spending five minutes with the tools above could be the difference between a Goodwill drop-off and a meaningful payday.
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