Gold investment options in India in 2026

Diwali 2026 falls on Sunday, 8 November. The days before it, including Dhanteras, are when many families buy gold. The useful question is which form you are buying, and what it costs to get the money back.

Five forms show up in shops and apps: jewellery and coins, a gold ETF, a gold mutual fund, a Sovereign Gold Bond you already hold or can buy from someone else, and digital gold. They move with the gold price. They do not cost the same, they are not equally easy to sell, and they are not protected in the same way.

Tax on the sale is a separate page. Use the guide to tax on gold for holding periods and rupee examples. This page is about how you hold the gold.

Five ways, side by side

Table: What changes when the form of gold changes

A government bond freezes the grams and adds interest. The rupee price can still fall.

Jewellery and coins

Making charges are the shop’s fee for turning metal into a piece. There is no government rate. One shop can charge ₹12,000 on a ₹1,00,000 gold value. The next shop can charge something else. When you sell, many shops price the gold and do not hand the making charges back.

GST on a finished piece is 3% of the total transaction value. The GST Council’s gems and jewellery FAQ says this applies whether making charges are on their own line or not. Heading 7113 on the CBIC schedule is that 3% (1.5% CGST and 1.5% SGST, or 3% IGST). Unwrought gold, the form many coins and bars take, is heading 7108 at the same 3%.

Say the gold in a 22K chain is priced at ₹1,00,000 and the shop’s making charge is ₹12,000. The transaction value is ₹1,12,000. GST at 3% is ₹3,360. You pay ₹1,15,360 before any hallmarking line the shop adds. That ₹12,000 is this example’s shop, not a rule.

Hallmarking is how you check the gold. BIS made hallmarking of gold jewellery and artefacts mandatory from 23 June 2021, first in 256 districts. The Bureau’s brief says coverage is now 392 districts, after the amendment order of 3 August 2026. The mark has the BIS logo, the purity in carat and fineness, and a 6-character HUID. HUID hallmarking started on 1 July 2021. Check the code in the BIS Care app before you pay. The grades in the current scheme are 9K (375), 14K (585), 18K (750), 20K (833), 22K (916), 23K (958), 24KS (995).

A 10 gram piece at 22K is fineness 916. That is 9.16 grams of gold, because 916 parts in 1,000 are gold.

An article under 2 grams is outside the mandatory order, as is a jeweller whose yearly turnover is up to ₹40,00,000, and Kundan, Polki and Jadau pieces. Gold bullion and coins are outside the jewellery order. A coin of 999 or 995 fineness may still be hallmarked by a BIS-licensed refinery or mint. The bill for a hallmarked piece should show the description, net weight, purity in carat and fineness, and hallmarking charges. A recognised centre bills the jeweller ₹75 per gold article, with a minimum of ₹200 a consignment. That is the centre’s charge to the shop, not a price the law sets for you.

Gold ETFs

A gold ETF is a mutual fund whose units trade on a stock exchange. You need a demat account and a trading account. You do not take the metal home.

SEBI’s November 2021 circular set the frame. Scheme documents filed with SEBI say the fund puts 95% to 100% of its assets in gold and gold-related instruments, of fineness 995 or higher. A small slice can sit in money-market instruments so the fund can pay sellers.

You pay the exchange price plus your broker’s charge. Brokerage is the broker’s card, not a SEBI rate. The fund’s yearly cost is the total expense ratio, already inside the NAV. For this kind of scheme the cap stated in SEBI-filed documents under Regulation 52(6)(b) is 1% of daily net assets. A fund can charge less. Read the factsheet. There is no making charge and no shop GST on the unit. Duties on the gold the fund bought are already in the NAV.

You can sell on a trading day if the units are in demat. The price can sit a little above or below the gold value. It suits someone who already has demat and wants grams they can sell without a shop.

Gold mutual funds

A gold mutual fund, in the form most people meet, is a fund of funds. It buys units of a gold ETF. You can invest with the mutual fund the way you invest in any other fund, including a monthly amount, without a demat account.

You pay two layers of cost: the ETF’s expense ratio and the fund’s own. A direct plan removes the distributor’s commission. It does not remove either ratio. Read both factsheets. SEBI’s redemption rules say how quickly the fund must pay you. The scheme document states the number of working days. For Diwali week, redeem on a working day and read the cut-off.

The tax clock is not the ETF’s clock. A listed ETF uses 12 months. Units of an unlisted gold fund use 24 months, like a coin. “Exchange traded” is the ETF. “Fund of fund” is the other one. On the capital gains calculator, the listed button is for the ETF and for a bond sold on the exchange.

It suits a monthly habit without a trading account. If you already have demat, the ETF is usually the simpler holding.

Sovereign Gold Bonds you can still hold

A Sovereign Gold Bond is a government security issued by the Reserve Bank on behalf of the Government of India. You pay cash. The bond is counted in grams of gold. On redemption, the Reserve Bank pays cash, using the gold price of that week. You do not collect a coin.

RBI’s FAQ and the calendar for 2023-24 Series IV set the shape of bonds that were issued. Interest is 2.5% a year on the issue price, credited twice a year. The tenor is 8 years. From the 5th year you can ask for premature redemption on an interest date. The smallest bond is 1 gram. In a fresh issue the ceiling was 4 kg for an individual, 4 kg for a Hindu undivided family, and 20 kg for a trust, in a financial year. Issue and redemption prices use the simple average of the closing price of 999 gold published by the India Bullion and Jewellers Association for the three working days before the relevant week. The bond can sit in demat and trade on the exchange. Only the demat form trades.

The last window RBI opened was 2023-24 Series IV. Subscription ran 12–16 February 2024. The bonds were issued on 21 February 2024 at ₹6,263 per gram. Online buyers who paid digitally were charged ₹50 less. That discount belonged to that issue.

Checked on 29 October 2026, the Reserve Bank’s Sovereign Gold Bond page does not list a later subscription calendar. The 2026 releases on that page are redemption prices for series issued years ago, including premature redemption from the fifth year and final redemption at eight years. Until RBI publishes a new calendar, there is no fresh bond to apply for at a bank or a post office.

Bonds already issued keep working. Interest still arrives and is taxed at your slab. RBI’s FAQ says the bond itself is not subject to TDS, and the holder still follows the tax law. A demat holder can sell on the exchange, where the price can sit above or below the grams. Premature redemption, from the fifth year, is with the bank, post office or SHCIL on an interest date. The FAQ says the request can be taken if it reaches the office at least a day before the interest is paid, and part of the holding can go, in multiples of one gram.

The tax guide has the current capital-gains rule. The Finance Act, 2026 narrowed it: a maturity redemption is outside capital gains only for an individual who held that bond from the original issue until maturity. A buyer on the exchange is not that holder. A sale before maturity, and a premature redemption, are transfers. The tax answer in the 2019 RBI FAQ is not the rule for tax year 2026-27.

Digital gold

Some apps let you buy a rupee amount of “digital gold” and show a gram balance. The metal, if it is there, sits with a vault the platform names. You do not get a demat unit, and you do not get a Reserve Bank certificate.

SEBI’s press release of 8 November 2025 (PR No. 70/2025) says digital gold is different from the gold products SEBI regulates: exchange-traded commodity derivatives, gold ETFs, and Electronic Gold Receipts. Digital gold is not notified as a security and is not regulated as a commodity derivative. It sits entirely outside SEBI. Investors can face counterparty and operational risks, and none of the investor-protection mechanisms of the securities market apply.

Digital gold is not a Sovereign Gold Bond. SEBI’s caution does not hand the product to the Reserve Bank. Treat the balance as a contract with the platform. If the company cannot pay, there is no SEBI process and no RBI bond behind the screenshot.

If the invoice is for gold, the CBIC schedule rate is 3%. Keep the invoice. The app’s screen is not your purchase cost. A later sale is taxed like a coin, which the tax guide works through. A very small festive purchase you will convert with the same platform is a different job from parking savings for years.

Tax, without repeating the whole bill

Buying is not the income-tax event. Selling is, and so is interest on a Sovereign Gold Bond. The tax guide has the rupee examples. The short map:

• Coins, jewellery, digital gold and an unlisted gold fund are short-term for 24 months or less, then taxed in your slabs. After that, section 197 charges 12.5%, plus 4% cess. No indexation, and no ₹1.25 lakh equity exemption.
• A listed gold ETF, and a Sovereign Gold Bond sold on the exchange, use 12 months.
• Bond interest is taxed every year. A maturity redemption is outside capital gains only in the narrow case the tax guide describes.

Run the sale on the capital gains calculator. “Coins, bars or jewellery” covers physical gold, digital gold and an unlisted gold fund. “Listed gold ETF” covers the ETF and a bond sold on the exchange.

Who should pick which

Wear it: jewellery. Check the HUID and keep the bill, because that bill is your cost.

Sell it, and you have demat: a gold ETF. The expense cap is 1%. Brokerage is on the contract note. A monthly amount without demat is a gold fund, with a second expense ratio and a 24-month clock if the units are not listed.

An existing Sovereign Gold Bond you can leave until redemption keeps the 2.5% interest. Buying someone else’s bond on the exchange does not make you the original holder, so the maturity exemption does not travel with it. Digital gold has no SEBI protection. Use it only as a balance you understand as a contract with that platform.

None of these promises a higher gold price on 8 November 2026. The costs above are the part you can know before you pay.

Figures were checked on 29 October 2026 against the CBIC schedule, the GST Council’s jewellery FAQ, the BIS hallmarking brief and jeweller FAQ, SEBI’s gold ETF circular and the 8 November 2025 digital-gold caution, and the Reserve Bank’s Sovereign Gold Bond notices. The tax numbers live with the calculator and the tax guide, which use the Income-tax Act, 2025 as amended by the Finance Act, 2026.