Quick and Easy Buying Guide
Carat weight: 1 carat = 200 milligrams = 6.5 mm diameter. Doubling weight doesn't double diameter.
Diamond clarity: FL/IF/VVS/VS = super expensive, near perfect. SI = best value if you can check a photo for obvious inclusions (defects).
Color: D-G = colorless, expensive, only if you have money to burn. H-J = best value. Can go lower in gold metal settings than white metal.
Cut: Better cut ratings let more light into a diamond, making it sparkle more. Very important property, don't skimp here.
Set a budget and minimum cut (Premium). Go J color for gold and I/H for white metals. Go searching for SI1/SI2 clarity diamonds at James Allen. Pick a diamond with small/no inclusions. Choose a ring setting and buy it risk-free (60-day returns).
1.62 Carat Diamonds
If the diamond is described as being 1.62 carats in weight, it can also be described as being a 162 point diamond.
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Each point in a diamond's weight is worth 2 mg, so a 162 points diamond weighs 324 mg. 1.62 carats in a diamond gets you around 7.68 mm of diamond, give or take.
A way of using numbers to help you compare diamonds is to calculate the cost per carat of diamond. Another property of the diamond which is important in determining how big the diamond will appear to the naked eye is the girdle thickness of the diamond. A thick girdle well store a lot of the diamonds mass in a place which does not help the diamond appear large.
Walk into a diamond shop and wait around, and sooner or later you'll hear someone getting confused or frustrated about the fact that the carat weight of a diamond and the width of the diamond are very different things - most likely they will be confused or frustrated because a diamond with double the carat weight is only a little bit wider. Is a handy hint - as well as searching for 1.62 diamonds, try starting your search by examining another property of the diamond, for instance the name of an online jewellery store you would be happy to buy a diamond from.
I'd rather have roses on my table than diamonds on my neck. Emma Goldman .
Many people buying a diamond engagement ring for the first time often go overboard with the size of the diamond, not realising how big the diamond will appear when you put it on a small woman's hand.
A shop assistant may show you a one carat diamond and a one carat emerald stone next to each other, and point out how much larger the emerald stone is. This is because emerald is a much lighter material, so for a given weight of it, it will appear much bigger than for an equivalent sized diamond.
Buying a diamond should really be about what you and your partner want, but if it's really important to you, know that the average diamond size in an engagement ring is about half carat, give or take.
It's interesting to note that while the small carat diamond (by small i mean one or two carats) may have only been discovered relatively recently, many of the spectacular large diamonds were found many hundreds of years ago, such as the regent diamond of france which was used by two of the king louis's, with a mighty size of 140 carats.
People say the four cs for a reason - diamond carat size is just one of the four cs and the others are arguably just as important in determining how 'attractive' and 'good' a diamond is.