The most expensive meteorite ever sold is NWA 16788, a 54-pound chunk of Mars that fetched $5.3 million at Sotheby’s New York on July 16, 2025. The final bid was $4.3 million, and fees took the bill to $5.3 million, more than double the $2 million low estimate. Below are the six highest verified meteorite sales we could pin down as of October 2026, with a price-per-gram figure wherever the weight is public, plus a short list of lots that were estimated but never sold.
| Rank | Meteorite | Price (USD) | Sale date | Sold at | Price per gram |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 6 | Seymchan pallasite slice, 9 inches | $43,750 | Year not confirmed | Heritage Auctions New York | Weight not confirmed |
| 5 | Seymchan pallasite sphere | About $131,500 | April (year not confirmed) | Christie’s | Weight not confirmed |
| 4 | Meteor Crater (Barringer) iron | $237,500 | February 2018 | Christie’s online | Weight not confirmed |
| 3 | NWA 11789, lunar breccia | $615,000 | October 2018 | RR Auction | About $112 |
| 2 | Tisserlitine 006, lunar sphere | $825,500 | July 2025 | Sotheby’s New York | Weight not confirmed |
| 1 | NWA 16788, Martian shergottite | $5,300,000 | July 2025 | Sotheby’s New York | About $216 |
6. Seymchan slice: $43,750
A 9-inch-tall slice of Seymchan, stuffed with olivine, was the most contested lot in a New York Heritage sale that organisers billed as the largest meteorite auction in history, with more than $1 million in total sales. It brought $43,750. We include it as the realistic upper end for a great display piece that is not a planetary rarity.
The year of this sale is not confirmed in our sources, and the premium status of the price is unstated.
5. Seymchan sphere: about $131,500
Pallasites are the pretty ones: olivine crystals the colour of boiled sweets set in metal. A polished Seymchan pallasite sphere beat an estimate of about £10,000 by more than eight times and hammered at £92,500, or about $131,500 at the time. It was the top lot of its sale, which tells you collectors pay for looks as much as for rarity.
The sources we found give the month but not the year, so we hold it at this rank on the strength of the price alone.
4. Meteor Crater iron: $237,500
Not every record needs a planet of origin. In February 2018 an iron meteorite from the Barringer Crater in Arizona sold for $237,500 in an online sale, the highest price at that time for a meteorite in an online-only auction. It is a local rock, the debris from the impact that dug the crater itself.
Our figure is the reported total for the lot. We have no verified weight, so no per-gram number is given.
3. NWA 11789: $615,000
Moon rocks do not come cheap when they arrive in one piece. This 5.5 kilogram (12 pound) lunar feldspathic breccia was found in six fragments that fit together like a jigsaw, which is why the auction house nicknamed it the Moon Puzzle. A winning bid of $612,500 was announced in October 2018, and the lot page shows $615,000 including the buyer’s premium.
At about 5,500 grams, that is roughly $112 a gram, half the Mars price. The rock went to a buyer who planned to put it on public display in Vietnam. Until 2025 it was the benchmark for lunar meteorites.
2. Tisserlitine 006: $825,500
The same July 2025 sale carried a grapefruit-sized lunar meteorite sphere, lot 74, billed as the largest known lunar sphere. The estimate was $300,000 to $500,000. It closed at $825,500, which makes it the second most valuable meteorite ever sold at auction and a record for a Moon rock of this kind.
The weight was not published in the sources we saw, so we leave the per-gram figure blank rather than guess. Our number comes from two independent reports of the result; we could not open a results page for the lot itself, so treat it as reported.
1. NWA 16788: $5,300,000
A meteorite hunter found this one in Niger’s Agadez region in November 2023, and it is the largest piece of Mars known on Earth. It weighs about 25 kilograms (54 pounds), roughly 70 percent more than the next biggest Martian rock, and on its own it adds about 7 percent to the planet’s known Martian material. Of more than 77,000 recognised meteorites, only about 400 come from Mars. This is an olivine-microgabbroic shergottite, which is a polite way of saying a slab of volcanic rock that left Mars after an impact.
Sotheby’s put the estimate at $2 million to $4 million and opened the bidding at $2 million. A 15-minute contest between room, phone and online bidders ended at $4.3 million, then fees pushed the total to $5.3 million. The buyer was not named. The rock was sold alongside a $30.5 million Ceratosaurus skeleton, which tells you what kind of week it was.
The price rests on Sotheby’s own announced total including buyer’s premium, cross-checked against two news reports of the hammer. Dividing by an approximate 24.5 kilograms gives about $216 a gram, which is our arithmetic and not an official figure.
Records set in 2025 and 2026
Everything at the top of this list happened in a single Sotheby’s sale in July 2025. Both the Mars record and the lunar record fell on the same day, and the old lunar benchmark from 2018 was beaten by about $200,000. We found no meteorite result in 2026 that broke either mark through October.
The timing matters. Sotheby’s runs its natural history sales in a themed week and the 2025 edition put a Mars rock and a dinosaur in the same week. Scientists publicly worried that a piece of Mars of this size might disappear into a private collection, a debate that usually follows a record in this category. Whether the new owner lends it to researchers has not been announced.
One lot is worth watching: a slice of the 2,005.9 gram Tisserlitine 001 lunar meteorite was offered by Christie’s in Shanghai in November 2024 at an estimate of 2 million to 3 million yuan, which would be roughly $175 a gram at the midpoint. We could not find a sold price, so it is not ranked.
A gram of Mars against a gram of gold
Gold has been trading above $100 a gram, so the Mars record works out to about twice that, and the lunar breccia from 2018 landed close to it. Common stony meteorites from the Sahara retail for a few dollars a gram, and cheap iron fragments cost less than a coffee. That spread is the whole market: a rock is priced by its parent body, then by its size, then by how good it looks on a plinth.
The per-gram column in our table is a rough yardstick, not a valuation. Big museum-grade pieces trade in a different league from slices, and a buyer paying $5.3 million is buying the only complete example, not 24,500 separate grams.
Not sold, but valued
The 650 kilogram Brenham pallasite main mass was estimated at about $711,000 to $1.14 million at Christie’s and attracted no bidder. It remains the clearest reminder that an estimate is not a price. Lower down the market, an Imilac pallasite slice at Bonhams estimated at about $13,500 to $16,000 sold for $23,180.
What drives these prices
- Planet of origin. Only about 400 recognised meteorites are from Mars and far fewer are lunar. Common chondrites sell by the gram for pocket money.
- Size in one piece. A complete 25 kilogram rock is not the same asset as 25 kilograms of fragments. Collectors and museums pay a premium for a main mass.
- A clean find story. Found in 2023 and sold in 2025, NWA 16788 arrived with fresh paperwork and a classification already published.
- Looks. Polished pallasites with glassy olivine outsell uglier iron by a wide margin per gram.
- The sale around it. A week of headline lots, including a dinosaur, brings in bidders who would never visit a mineral auction.
FAQ
What is the most expensive meteorite ever sold?
NWA 16788, a 25 kilogram Martian meteorite, sold for $5.3 million including fees at Sotheby’s New York on July 16, 2025.
What is the most expensive Moon meteorite?
The lunar sphere Tisserlitine 006 reportedly sold for $825,500 at Sotheby’s in July 2025. The previous benchmark was NWA 11789 at about $615,000 in 2018.
How much is a meteorite worth per gram?
It depends on the type. The Mars record works out to about $216 a gram on our arithmetic, a large lunar piece to about $112, while common stony meteorites sell for a few dollars a gram.
Who bought the Mars meteorite?
The buyer was not publicly named.
Was there a meteorite record in 2026?
We found none through October 2026. The July 2025 results still stand.
Is it legal to sell a meteorite?
Rules vary by country and by where the rock was found. Reputable houses sell pieces with documentation of origin, export and classification.
How we put this list together
We ranked items by verified sale price, drawing on auction house results and disclosed sales compiled in an internal valuation model. Prices are approximate, depend on whether a buyer’s premium is included, and change as new records are set.
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Last updated: October 2026.
