Where does iridium come from?

South Africa leads the line by value and by weight, but its lead is far larger in value. In 2024 it supplied 48% of the line's export value, and the three next-largest exporters, Germany, United Kingdom and Belgium, together supplied about 34% (33.9% on the unrounded customs values; our arithmetic). The USGS table of platinum and palladium mine production does not name those three countries, and each exported more value than it imported. The export table records where metal crosses a border, which is not the same as where it is mined, and USGS's 91% estimate of South Africa's share of mined iridium in 2022 is a different measure for a different year.

Value and weight tell different stories about the second-largest exporter. Germany had 17% of export value but 31.5% of export weight, against 38.3% of weight for South Africa, which put Germany close to South Africa by kilograms and far behind by value. Average value per gram was about $13.67 for Germany and $30.93 for South Africa. Because the line mixes metals worth about $14.50 and about $154.66 per gram at USGS's 2024 averages, a different mix could account for part of such a gap, but form, grade and valuation can also differ, and customs data do not say what each cargo contained.

The buying side is more one-directional. Japan, Hong Kong and United States, the three largest importers, took in $750.7 million, $391.9 million and $237 million and sent out $21.2 million, $72.2 million and $123.8 million. Japan took in about 35 times the value it sent out. Importers and exporters overlap as names but not as roles: the three largest exporters after South Africa sell more than they buy, and the three biggest buyers buy more than they sell. The data come with two limits: they cannot separate iridium from ruthenium, and they cannot say which country mined the metal.

This page carries no production ranking and no world production total for iridium, and it says so for a plain reason: no source used here prints either. The USGS platinum-group metals chapter lists mine production by country for palladium and platinum only. For iridium, osmium, rhodium and ruthenium it prints United States import quantities and, for all but osmium, prices, with no country production rows (USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026). USGS does not give its reason. What the sources do show is that iridium is one of six platinum-group metals found together in the same ores. They are separated from one another only in the last refining stage, to a purity above 99.99% (USGS Professional Paper 1802-N, 2017), and companies report them unevenly. For 2022 USGS records one South African producer giving a combined figure for refined iridium and ruthenium of about 16,300 kg, and another giving a combined figure for gold, iridium and ruthenium, with the split between metals estimated from the ratios in the concentrate, called prill splits (USGS Minerals Yearbook 2022, South Africa). A ranking built from numbers like these would mix measured and estimated figures.

What USGS does print is figures for one country in one year. South Africa's mine production of iridium was 6,160 kg in 2022 and of ruthenium 27,894 kg (USGS Minerals Yearbook 2022, South Africa, Table 1). The same Yearbook puts South Africa's estimated share of world mined iridium at 91% by volume, and of mined ruthenium at 93% (advance release of December 2025). Those are figures for a single country and not a ranking: the Yearbook gives no output or share for any other country. The reserves figures are for the group as a whole. USGS puts world reserves of platinum-group metals at more than 76 million kg, of which South Africa holds 63 million kg, Russia 11 million kg and Zimbabwe 1.3 million kg (USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026). Those are totals for all six metals, not for iridium. USGS's platinum and palladium production table names the United States, Canada, Russia, South Africa and Zimbabwe, and the chapter prints no iridium output for any of them.

The ores differ in their mix of metals. USGS says 72% of identified platinum-group resources lie in reef-type and contact-type deposits of the Bushveld Complex in South Africa, 10% in the Noril'sk-Talnakh area of Russia and 8% in the Great Dyke of Zimbabwe, and that the mix of metals differs from deposit to deposit: South Africa and Zimbabwe have a higher proportion of platinum than any other major deposit, and the Russian deposits have far more palladium (USGS Professional Paper 1802-N, 2017). Within the Bushveld, the Yearbook describes the deposits of the Western and Eastern Limbs as tending to be richer in iridium, rhodium and ruthenium and those of the Northern Limb as richer in palladium, and it says the UG2 layer is richer in iridium, palladium, rhodium and ruthenium than the Merensky layer (USGS Minerals Yearbook 2022, South Africa).

Company figures for 2022 show how small iridium is next to its partners. At the operations where the Yearbook gives both figures for 2022, ruthenium output was between 3.5 and 4.5 times iridium output (our arithmetic on the USGS figures). Examples are 4,097 kg of ruthenium against 920 kg of iridium at Northam's Booysendal, Eland and Zondereinde mines, 3,424 kg against 968 kg at Sibanye-Stillwater's Marikana mine, about 870 kg against 240 kg at Impala's Marula mine, and 69% against 17% of the gold, iridium and ruthenium total at Impala Rustenburg. USGS also reports that iridium made up about 4% and ruthenium about 3% of South African platinum-group miners' earnings in 2022, against 50% for rhodium, 23% for palladium and 20% for platinum. The sources used here do not say how mine plans are set. Because the Yearbook gives no iridium output for any country but South Africa, the origin picture on this page is built from export data.

One customs line covers the whole of what this site tracks for iridium: unwrought iridium, osmium and ruthenium and their powders (HS 711041). An HS code is the international product code customs officers use, and this one groups three metals under a single number. The table therefore cannot separate iridium from ruthenium or osmium, and every figure in this section is for the three together. Where USGS gives a single metal, the text says so. See HS codes for how customs lines divide a product.

In 2024 the world exported $2.3 billion of the line (CEPII BACI). South Africa was the largest exporter by value with 48%, followed by Germany (17%), United Kingdom (9.9%), Belgium (6.5%) and United States (5.4%). Hong Kong (3.2%), China (1.4%), Singapore (1.4%) and Russia (1.3%) came next. In the data used here South Africa and Germany also lead by weight.

The buyers are a different set. The largest importer was Japan with 33% of the line's $2.3 billion, followed by Hong Kong (17%), United States (10%), Germany (9.2%), United Kingdom (7.9%), China (7.8%) and Belgium (5.2%). Those seven names also appear among the exporters, but the balance between the two sides differs sharply by country. Germany, United Kingdom and Belgium each exported more value than they imported: $397.8 million out against $209.7 million in for Germany, $226.1 million against $180.5 million for United Kingdom, and $147.6 million against $118.9 million for Belgium. Japan took in $750.7 million and sent out $21.2 million, Hong Kong took in $391.9 million and sent out $72.2 million, and United States took in $237 million and sent out $123.8 million. The line also lists Other Asia, nes, a catch-all label in the customs data, among both exporters and importers.

Apart from South Africa, the countries in the USGS platinum and palladium production table sit at very different levels in the export list. United States, named in that table, is fifth with 5.4%. Russia, which USGS calls the world's leading producer of mined palladium, supplied 1.3% of the line's export value in 2024. Canada and Zimbabwe, also named in the table, are not among the fifteen largest exporters by value or by weight in this data. The export table records where metal crosses a border, which need not be where it was mined.

Two cross-checks limit what the table can tell. First, USGS counts United States imports metal by metal: 1,360 kg of iridium, 9,780 kg of ruthenium and 1 kg of osmium in 2024, 11,141 kg in all, measured as platinum-group-metal content and over a wider set of tariff codes than the one customs line (USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026). The customs data used here record United States imports of the whole line at 10,548 kg net weight, about 5% lower, so the two bases differ. Second, the weights show oddities. France is the largest importer by weight in this data, at 15,892 kg, but its imports were worth only $6.2 million, about $0.39 per gram, and Thailand's 2,831 kg of exports were worth $1.4 million. Those unit values are far below the ruthenium price USGS prints for 2024, so this page ranks by value and uses weight only as a cross-check.

This page quotes no iridium or ruthenium price series, because this site found no free public price series for either metal. The registry records no exchange contract and no benchmark for them. What USGS prints is an annual average. Its tables give Engelhard unfabricated-metal average annual prices, sourced to S&P Global Platts Metals Week, in dollars per troy ounce, a unit of 31.1035 grams. For iridium the figures are $5,158.40 in 2021, $4,581.93 in 2022, $4,672.78 in 2023, $4,810.40 in 2024 and an estimated $4,400 in 2025. For ruthenium they are $576.12, $577.02, $466.49, $451.02 and an estimated $690 (USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026). USGS describes the 2025 estimate as a fall of 9% for iridium and a rise of 53% for ruthenium from the 2024 average.

The metric version shows the scale. At the 2024 averages iridium was about $154.66 per gram and ruthenium about $14.50 per gram, the first about 10.7 times the second (our conversion of the USGS figures at 31.1035 grams per troy ounce). In the same USGS table platinum averaged $960.70 and palladium $994.90 per ounce in 2024, so iridium cost about five times as much as platinum per ounce while ruthenium cost less than half as much. For comparison, the customs value of the line averaged about $24.66 per gram in 2024 (the $2.3 billion of exports over 92,331 kg of net weight). That sits much closer to ruthenium's price than to iridium's. United States imports are weighted toward ruthenium in the USGS figures above (9,780 kg of ruthenium against 1,360 kg of iridium in 2024), but the customs record does not give the mix for the world line, and Germany's $13.67 per gram is below ruthenium's USGS price, so mix alone does not explain the unit values. A customs value is also not a market price, because each line mixes forms and grades.

USGS offers reasons for the 2025 moves, with some hedging. It attributes the rises in platinum-group prices in general to lower production and higher demand, and says the fall in iridium may have been affected by higher production and by fading investor enthusiasm for hydrogen power. It does not attribute the 2025 ruthenium rise to a specific cause. The sources used for this page do not describe how contracts are written, how often prices are reset or what premiums buyers pay, so the page says nothing about contract terms. Prices on dealer sites are not quoted.

Iridium comes out of mines that also yield platinum, palladium and rhodium. USGS estimates South African production of platinum-group metals fell 9% in 2025 from 2024, which it attributes to declining palladium prices, higher costs of deep-level mining and disrupted electricity supply, and Russian output fell an estimated 6% (USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026). Those figures cover all platinum-group metals in mined material and not iridium separately.

USGS lists iridium as used in electrochemical processes and as a chemical catalyst (USGS, final 2025 list of critical minerals, November 2025). USGS says the estimated 9% fall in the 2025 average price may have been affected by increased production and waning investor enthusiasm in the hydrogen power market. The sources used give no tonnage of iridium used in electrolysis.

USGS lists ruthenium as used in catalysts, electrical contacts and the chip resistors in computers. Johnson Matthey's press release of 14 May 2026 (https://matthey.com/media/2026/johnson-matthey-publishes-2026-pgm-market-report1) says ruthenium is critical to the magnetic layers in hard disks. USGS Professional Paper 1802-N lists increased ruthenium use in computer hard disk drives among the major events affecting platinum-group metal prices since 1880. USGS estimates ruthenium's 2025 average price at 53% above 2024 (USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026).

Mined iridium has to be refined before it is traded as metal, and USGS records a case where refined output fell by more than mine output. It attributes a fall in one South African producer's refined output of all platinum-group metals in 2022 to delays in rebuilding a smelter and to reduced power supplies, and records that this producer's refined iridium and ruthenium total fell from about 21,100 kg in 2021 to about 16,300 kg in 2022 (USGS Minerals Yearbook 2022, South Africa). The Yearbook also records that Northam sold its production to Heraeus South Africa for refining and that iridium, rhodium and ruthenium were exported to Germany for refining in 2022.

Iridium and ruthenium are on the US 2025 critical minerals list, and USGS names rhodium, platinum and palladium there too, but not osmium. The EU Critical Raw Materials Act of 2024 lists platinum group metals as a group, as both critical and strategic. USGS also reports that the US government stockpile plan for fiscal year 2025 listed 15 kg of iridium as a potential disposal and no potential acquisition, and that no plan was released for fiscal year 2026 (USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026). A listing is an assessment of supply risk and not a finding of shortage.

USGS says that for some industrial uses one platinum-group metal can replace another, with losses in efficiency (USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026). The chapter gives no substitution figures for iridium or ruthenium, so the effect on demand for either cannot be measured from it. The one quantified case in the chapter is palladium replacing platinum in catalytic converters, which is covered on the platinum and palladium pages.

Iridium occurs in platinum-group ores together with the other five platinum-group metals. Platinum-group ores are mined from reef-type deposits, narrow sheets of ore that are generally worked underground, and from open pits where the ore is thick and shallow, as at the Platreef in the Bushveld Complex (USGS Professional Paper 1802-N, 2017). The rock is crushed and ground to free the platinum-group minerals, which are then concentrated by froth flotation into a sulfide concentrate. The dried concentrate goes into an electric arc furnace that can run hotter than 1,500 degrees Celsius, which melts it into a matte that holds the valuable metals and a slag that is discarded. Converters blow air through the matte to remove iron and sulfur, and a base-metals refinery then leaches out the copper and nickel (USGS Professional Paper 1802-N, 2017).

What is left is a mixture of the six platinum-group metals. The last stage separates them by hydrometallurgy, using solvent extraction, precipitation and dissolution in chloride solutions, until each metal reaches a purity above 99.99%, and USGS lists ingots, grains and a fine powder called sponge as the forms of the refined product (USGS Professional Paper 1802-N, 2017). HS 711041 is defined for unwrought and powder forms, which are the kinds of form USGS lists for the refined product.

The mix of metals differs from mine to mine. One case in USGS's 2022 Yearbook shows the arithmetic: at Impala Rustenburg the gold, iridium and ruthenium recovered in 2022 totaled 4,780 kg, of which ruthenium was an estimated 69% and iridium 17%, based on prill splits. A producer can therefore report a combined figure and leave the split to be estimated, so this page ranks nothing by iridium output. See producing vs exporting vs processing for why a country's mining, refining and export rank can differ.

USGS does not publish iridium or ruthenium consumption by end use, so this page gives no share for any use. What it does publish is a description of what each metal is used for. USGS's list of critical minerals says iridium is used in electrochemical processes and as a chemical catalyst, and ruthenium in catalysts, electrical contacts and the chip resistors in computers (USGS, final 2025 list of critical minerals, November 2025). The Royal Society of Chemistry adds that iridium goes into spark plug contacts because of its high melting point and low reactivity, and that ruthenium coats the electrodes used to make chlorine and catalyzes ammonia and acetic acid production (Royal Society of Chemistry, periodic table).

Platinum-group alloys more broadly are the best-known coating for industrial crucibles used to make chemicals and synthetic materials, including the high-purity crystals used in light-emitting diodes, and the group is used in computer hard disks, hybrid integrated circuits and multilayer ceramic capacitors (USGS Professional Paper 1802-N, 2017). Johnson Matthey's press release of 14 May 2026 (https://matthey.com/media/2026/johnson-matthey-publishes-2026-pgm-market-report1) says ruthenium is critical to the magnetic layers in hard disks. None of these sources gives a quantity of either metal consumed in any application, so this page treats them as descriptions and not as measured demand.

Iridium and ruthenium are both on the US critical minerals list. Osmium, which shares the customs line, is not named on it, and USGS prints small United States import figures for it: 1 kg in 2024 and an estimated 57 kg in 2025 (USGS Mineral Commodity Summaries 2026).

The chain has four stages and a different set of countries at each. Mining and concentration happen in the platinum-group deposits, with South Africa accounting for the 91% share of mined iridium that USGS estimates for 2022. Smelting and base-metal refining follow at the large producers. The metals are then separated and refined, some in South Africa and some abroad: USGS records that Northam sold its production to Heraeus South Africa, which made refined platinum and palladium at Port Elizabeth, and that iridium, rhodium and ruthenium were exported to Germany for refining (USGS Minerals Yearbook 2022, South Africa, citing company reports for 2022 and 2023). The customs data for 2024 do not show who sold to whom, so this page cannot say how much of what Germany exports came from that route. They do show that Germany, United Kingdom and Belgium each exported more value of the line than they imported, so they were net sellers of it.

The last stage is the buyers: Japan (33% of import value), Hong Kong (17%), United States (10%) and Germany (9.2%). The sources used do not say what each buyer does with the metal. Japan, the largest buyer, sent out only 0.9% of the line's export value in 2024.

Two stages where supply can narrow are concentration and refining. One country mined an estimated 91% of the world's iridium in 2022, and refining is a separate step that can be disrupted: USGS reports that Amplats, the leading South African producer, refined about 135,900 kg of platinum-group metals in 2022 against 177,800 kg in 2021, a fall of about 24% (our arithmetic), while its mined platinum-group output fell about 9%, and attributes the drop in refined output to a smelter rebuild and reduced power supply (USGS Minerals Yearbook 2022, South Africa). For the United States USGS prints import sources and net import reliance for platinum and palladium only, so for iridium and ruthenium the chapter gives import quantities and nothing about origin. Iridium and ruthenium are on the US 2025 critical minerals list and the EU lists platinum group metals as critical and strategic. The critical minerals hub lists every commodity on this site that appears on those lists, and the glossary entry defines the term. Related pages are platinum, palladium and rhodium, which come from the same ores.