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3 Great Gold ETFs for the No. 1 Metal

Barchart·08/13/2026 09:02:09

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Gold prices closed out 2025 worth 65% more than where they started—the best annual gain for the yellow metal in more than four decades. For those of you who love big, round numbers, gold also managed to surpass the $4,000 mark for the first time. 2026 has been an entirely different story. The auric metal started the year with a head of steam and cleared the $5,000 mark; however, it has since been turned back thanks to a rising U.S. dollar and Treasury yields, as well as international central-bank selling.

But I'm not here to discuss whether gold will reclaim or even surpass its previous highs. I'm just here to talk about the many ways exchange-traded funds can help you get exposure if you want it.

Here are some of the best gold ETFs you can buy. Some of them hold gold directly, while others represent less direct (but in some cases, more potent) exposure to this shiny commodity.

Disclaimer: This article does not constitute individualized investment advice. Individual securities, funds, and/or other investments appear for your consideration and not as personalized investment recommendations. Act at your own discretion.

Why Should I Buy Gold ETFs Instead of Gold?

One argument for holding physical gold is pretty much a catastrophic-case scenario: The global economy falls apart and paper money no longer means anything, but having gold coins and bullion will allow you to continue buying and trading for whatever it is you need.

But that's not an investment case; that's a hedge against the apocalypse. If we're at the point where we're exchanging gold bits and otherwise bartering for goods and services, I don't think you'll be worrying about your 401(k) anymore.

If we're talking about a normal-case scenario where you plan on making it to retirement without being bitten by a zombie, investing in physical gold is mighty inconvenient. You have to have physical gold transported to you, you have to safely store it (and you'll likely want to insure it), and should you want to sell it, you'll have to find a buyer and arrange for transportation to the seller.

Or you could just buy gold ETFs, which allow you to get either direct or indirect exposure to the metal as easily as buying a single stock.

Your call.

The Best Gold ETFs to Buy Now

If you're convinced that ETFs are an ideal way to buy gold, the next thing to do is pick one.

The world of gold-related ETFs is relatively tight, at just a few dozen products. Still, some are better than similarly built rivals, while others provide a type of gold exposure that other funds simply don't.

Here are three picks from my broader look at the best gold ETFs to buy now.

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iShares Gold Trust Micro

Style: Physical gold
Assets under management: $7.1 billion
Expense ratio: 0.09%, or 90¢ per year for every $1,000 invested

The iShares Gold Trust Micro (IAUM) works the same as most other physical gold ETFs. It's backed by gold that's stashed away in vaults (in London and New York, specifically).

But where IAUM stands apart is its cost. At least for right now, it's the best gold ETF for low fees, charging a thin 0.09% annually.

Why do I say "for right now"? Generally speaking, virtually every fund is at risk of another fund undercutting it on price—so that risk is rarely worth mentioning. However, in this case, gold ETFs aren't far removed from an intense, yearslong fee war that saw smaller operators undercut legacy funds like GLD and IAU, which eventually prompted their providers (State Street Global Advisors and iShares, respectively) to create cheaper versions that could compete on price.

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Do I think iShares' micro gold fund is at immediate risk of another fund beating it on fees? Not really, and even if that does happen, IAUM would still be incredibly cheap. But just given the relatively recent fee actions in the space, it's fair to say IAUM is at slightly-higher-than-normal risk of that happening.

Lastly, while buy-and-hold investors don't really need to be concerned with uber-tight price spreads and robust options markets, they do need at least enough liquidity that they can enter and exit positions whenever they please. And while IAUM has less liquidity than bigger funds like the SPDR Gold Shares (GLD), it still trades a very-liquid 5 million shares daily.

iShares MSCI Global Gold Miners ETF

Style: Gold miners
Assets under management: $2.4 billion
Expense ratio: 0.39%, or $3.90 per year for every $1,000 invested

A less direct—but often more powerful—way to profit off the price of gold is to buy gold mining companies.

Your typical gold mining company pulls gold ore from the earth and converts it into doré bars, which are then sent off for further refining. It's a really straightforward business model in which they try to sell gold for a higher price than what it cost them to extract it.

If a miner spends $1,500 to produce one ounce of gold, and it sells for $4,000 per ounce, great! But if it sells for $1,000 per ounce … well, that's not so great. So it's pretty easy to see how changes in the price of gold would directly impact these firms' bottom lines and, as a result, their stock prices.

It's also important to understand that gold miners often trade in a more volatile fashion than gold itself. When gold rises, miners tend to rise by a greater degree, and when gold declines, miners tend to decline even faster. Which makes sense, given that publicly traded companies add elements of risk and reward that gold doesn't possess on its own.

If you appreciate the somewhat leveraged returns gold miners provide, you can buy them via the iShares MSCI Global Gold Miners ETF (RING). This index fund holds a tight grouping of 40 miners that are primarily (and in some cases entirely) in the business of gold. It's market capitalization-weighted, too, which means the bigger the company, the more assets are allocated to it. Right now, for instance, mega-miners Newmont (NEM) accounts for a whopping 17% of RING's assets, Agnico Eagle Mines (AEM) represents another 13%, and the top five holdings cumulatively account for more than half the ETF's weight.

And unlike a lump of gold, gold miners actually pay dividends—RING pays you a decent 1.4% annually to hold it.

The biggest, most established name in the space is the VanEck Gold Miners ETF (GDX), which commands more than 10 times the assets RING has collected. But iShares' fund has outperformed GDX over every meaningful time period, thanks in part to its cheaper expense ratio (0.39% to GDX's 0.51%).

Invesco DB Precious Metals Fund

Style: Precious metals futures
Assets under management: $224.3 million
Expense ratio: 0.70%*, or $7.00 per year for every $1,000 invested

Numerous gold miners don't mine for gold alone—they might also mine for silver, copper, and other metals. Thus, any gold mining ETF you hold will provide you exposure not just to gold prices, but the prices of other metals, too … even if it's just incidentally.

But the Invesco DB Precious Metals Fund (DBP) intentionally exposes you to more than just gold.

DBP provides roughly 75% exposure to gold, a little less than 20% to silver, and the rest to other precious metals such as platinum. But the ETF doesn't represent physical metal stored somewhere; it holds metal futures, as well as U.S. Treasury securities and money market instruments that are used as collateral to back the futures positions.

Futures-based commodity funds are very different creatures than "spot" (physical) funds. Spot funds will always give you performance that's more closely tied to a commodity's spot price than futures, which moreso reflect where traders think a commodity will trade in the future. Futures also involve leverage, which can magnify gains and losses alike.

If you prefer the simplicity of spot ETFs that directly track the metal, you're better off just buying physical-metal ETFs. DBP merely represents a streamlined way to diversify your commodity exposure in a single fund.

* 0.76% gross expense ratio is reduced with a 6-basis-point fee waiver until at least Aug. 31, 2026.

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