To pan for gold, you fill a gold pan with gravel from a stream, shake it underwater so the heavy gold sinks to the bottom, and then tilt and swirl the pan to wash the lighter sand and rock over the edge. You repeat that until only a little black sand is left, and any gold sits right at the bottom where you can pick it out.
Gold panning for beginners is mostly about patience, since the method works because gold is so heavy. The U.S. Geological Survey puts pure gold at about 19.3 times the weight of water, while the rock and sand around it is closer to 2.5 times. That big gap is why a pan full of dirt can be washed down to a few flakes without losing them, as long as you go slowly.
What you need to pan for gold
You can start with very little gear. A gold pan with riffles (the ridges along one side) is the main tool. A classifier, which is a round screen that sits on top of the pan, saves a lot of time by sorting out the big rocks before you start. Add a small shovel or trowel, a bucket, tweezers, a snuffer bottle (a small squeeze bottle for sucking up flakes) and a little glass vial to keep what you find.
Gold pans come in sizes from about 10 to 17 inches across, and 14 inches is the most common. A 10 to 14 inch pan is easier on your arms when you’re learning, while a bigger pan moves more dirt once you’re comfortable. Green, black and red plastic pans are popular because gold and black sand stand out against them.
If you use a new steel pan, get the factory oil off it first. Oil can make fine gold float right out of the pan. Most people now use plastic pans, which don’t have this problem.
Our guide to gold prospecting equipment covers the full gear list, including sluice boxes, picks and how to save money on used tools.
Where to pan for gold
Gold doesn’t spread evenly through a creek. It drops wherever the water slows down, because the water can no longer carry something that heavy. The USGS notes that gold in streams often ends up on or near bedrock, and that fine gold collects in low spots and pockets in sand and gravel bars where the current slacks off.
Good places to fill your pan include:
- Inside bends. Water slows on the inside of a curve, so gravel bars there are worth testing.
- Behind boulders. Check the downstream side of big rocks, where the water swirls and slows.
- Bedrock cracks. Where bedrock shows in or near the creek, scrape out the cracks and low spots. Gold works its way down into them over time.
- Low-water gravel. In late summer, bars that are underwater in spring stick out and are easy to dig. They were laid down by the high water that moves gold.
The place also has to be legal. Pick a spot on public land that is open to prospecting and is outside any active mining claim. Our guide to where to find gold goes through the best areas state by state.
Where people are staking placer claims right now
A placer claim covers loose gold in sand and gravel, the same kind of gold you pan for. (The claim records don’t say which mineral a claim is for, so some placer claims are for other loose minerals.) In the old gold districts, placer claims still pile up along the same creeks the early miners worked. These are active placer claims in a few well-known gold counties:
| County | Known for | Active placer claims |
|---|---|---|
| Yavapai County, Arizona | Lynx Creek, the Hassayampa River and the Bradshaw Mountains | 2,318 |
| Baker County, Oregon | Sumpter and the upper Powder River | 743 |
| Sierra County, California | Downieville and the North Yuba River | 716 |
| Josephine County, Oregon | The Rogue River’s tributaries and the Greenback District | 697 |
| Boise County, Idaho | The Boise Basin | 664 |
| Custer County, South Dakota | Black Hills creeks | 211 |
| Kittitas County, Washington | Swauk Creek and Liberty | 70 |
Source: Gold Maps Online analysis of BLM mining claim records, October 2026 (claims active as of October 25, 2026).
People keep staking new ground, too. Across the 12 western states we map, more than 52,000 mining claims staked in 2025 are still active, and that undercounts the year because some 2025 claims have already been dropped. For a panner, the takeaway is simple: the creeks with the best gold history are also the ones most likely to be claimed, so check before you dig.
How to pan for gold step by step
Find a spot where slow-moving water is at least six inches deep, with a comfortable place to sit or kneel close by.
- Classify your dirt. Set the classifier on top of the pan and fill it with gravel. Shake it in the water so the fine material falls through into the pan. Check the big rocks for nuggets before you toss them.
- Submerge the pan. Fill the pan about three quarters full and hold it just under the surface so everything gets soaked.
- Break up the clay. Work any clay, roots and moss with your fingers until the lumps fall apart. Clay can hold gold, so don’t throw out lumps without breaking them up first.
- Shake to settle. Keep the pan level and underwater and shake it hard from side to side. This loosens everything up so the gold can sink to the bottom. Don’t shake so hard that material flies out.
- Tilt and wash off the top layer. Tip the pan slightly away from you, with the riffles on the low side. Swirl it with a gentle forward motion so the water carries the top layer of light sand and gravel over the edge.
- Repeat. Level the pan, shake again to settle the gold, then tilt and wash off another layer. Do this over and over until only a cup or two of heavy material is left.
- Work the black sands. What’s left is called black sand, and the USGS says it’s mostly magnetite, a heavy iron mineral. Lift the pan out with an inch or so of water in it and swirl slowly. The black sand fans out across the bottom, and any gold shows up as a yellow tail at the edge. Go slow here, because this is where most gold gets lost. A magnet under a plastic pan can pull some of the black sand away.
- Pick out the gold. Use the snuffer bottle to suck up flakes, or tweezers for bigger pieces, and put them in your vial.
Your first few pans will be slow. That’s normal, and going slow keeps your gold in the pan instead of back in the creek.
A good way to learn is to practice at home before you go. Put a few pieces of small lead birdshot in a pan of sand and gravel, pan it down in a tub of water, and see how many you keep. Lead is lighter than gold, so if you can keep the shot in the pan, you’ll keep the gold too. Do this in a tub, not a creek, so the lead stays out of the water.
How much gold will you find?
Most of what beginners find is fine gold: tiny flakes and specks that panners call “color.” Nuggets happen, but they’re rare, and most people pan for the fun of the hunt rather than to make money. A full-size 16 inch pan holds about 22 pounds of gravel, and 911Metallurgist’s guide puts an experienced panner at about 10 full pans an hour. Beginners go slower than that, which is fine.
If you want to move more dirt, the usual next step is a small sluice box, which washes gravel in a steady stream of water. Many people use the pan to test spots, then bring in a sluice where the pan shows color, as long as local rules allow it.
What gold looks like, and what fool’s gold looks like
Real gold in a pan is usually small flat flakes or tiny specks, with a soft, butter yellow color. It stays at the very bottom of the pan and doesn’t move much when you swirl. Gold is also soft, about as hard as a penny according to the USGS, so a flake will bend or dent if you press it with a pin.
Pyrite, often called fool’s gold, is the most common mix up. It’s brassy and a bit greenish next to real gold, and it often forms little cubes with flat sides. Pyrite is brittle, so it breaks or crumbles when you press it instead of bending. If you rub it on the back of a white tile, it leaves a black streak, while gold leaves a yellow one.
Mica is the other one to watch for. It’s thin, shiny flakes that can look gold at some angles. Mica is light, so it washes out of the pan easily, and it breaks into tiny bits when you scratch it.
Common beginner mistakes
- Going too fast. Swirling hard near the end throws fine gold out with the sand. Slow down as the pan gets lighter.
- Tilting too far. A steep tilt lets gold slide over the edge, so keep the angle gentle.
- Skipping the shake. If you don’t shake the pan level between washes, the gold doesn’t get a chance to settle, and it goes out with the top layer.
- Not breaking up clay. Gold stuck in clay lumps gets tossed out with them.
- Digging only the surface. The best gold is usually deeper, down near bedrock, so dig down when you can.
- Panning in the wrong spot. Fast, open water with no gravel bars or bedrock rarely holds much. Look for places where the water slows.
Places to learn and pan legally
If you’d like to try it before you buy gear or hunt for a creek, a few public places make it easy:
- Marshall Gold Discovery State Historic Park, California. The park in Coloma, where the California gold rush started, runs 15 minute panning lessons followed by about half an hour of panning in troughs. California State Parks lists the lesson at $12 per person. Pans and hands only are allowed on the east side of the river, across the Mount Murphy Bridge.
- Cache Creek, Colorado. This BLM area near Granite, run by the Royal Gorge Field Office, is open to recreational gold panning and sluicing. Motorized access runs from Memorial Day weekend through November 30. Call the field office at (719) 269-8500 for current rules.
- Libby Creek Gold Panning Area, Montana. This spot in the Kootenai National Forest, south of Libby, allows hand tools like picks, shovels, buckets and pans. Motorized equipment, sluices and rockers aren’t allowed, according to Montana’s tourism office.
Gold panning rules and mining claims
Rules change from state to state and even from one stretch of river to the next. On most federal land, the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) treats hand panning as casual use as long as it barely disturbs the ground, but motorized gear, suction dredges and digging with machines usually need permits or aren’t allowed at all. Some states have their own rules on top of that. For example, Washington lets you pan under the rules in its Gold and Fish pamphlet, while anything motorized needs a separate permit. Check with the local BLM or Forest Service office and the state before you go.
National parks are off limits, because Park Service rules ban digging or removing minerals, so leave your pan at home when you visit one. State-owned land varies, and Washington, for example, keeps state-owned land closed to panning unless you get a placer mining contract from its Department of Natural Resources.
On open public land, you can usually keep the gold you pan for your own use. The biggest rule is to stay off other people’s claims. An active mining claim gives its owner the right to the minerals there, even on public land. BLM’s own guide for panners says you need the claim owner’s permission before you pan on an existing claim, and Washington’s state geologists treat mining claims like private land. Taking gold from someone’s claim without permission is mineral trespass, which can bring civil penalties.
This is the part our maps help with. They show October 2026 claim data in five layers: active lode claims, active placer claims, abandoned lode claims, abandoned placer claims, and old mines and prospects. Turn on the active placer and lode layers and you can see which creeks are already claimed before you drive out. The maps work in Google Earth and in Organic Maps, which runs offline, so you can still check where you are when there’s no cell signal. To check a single claim’s details, see our guide to checking a mining claim in BLM’s MLRS.
Closed claims are worth a look, too. Abandoned gold claims mark ground someone once thought was worth staking, and once a claim is closed the ground may be open to panning again. Each state page has a section on where to pan, such as gold panning in California and gold panning in Colorado.
Safety and leaving the creek as you found it
Creek rocks are slick and spring water is cold and fast, so wear boots with good grip and stay out of high water. Go with a friend if you can, and tell someone where you’ll be, since many gold creeks have no cell signal. Fill in the holes you dig, keep away from undercut banks, and pack out your trash. Never go into old mine tunnels; they can cave in or hold bad air.
Once you get the feel for it, a pan of creek gravel takes a few minutes, and that first flake of real gold in the bottom of the pan makes the slow start worth it.