The Royal Mint released the first Silver Britannia in 1997 to mark the 10th anniversary of the Gold Britannia's 1987 launch — notably, that first-year coin was proof-only, with no bullion-strike version, which makes 1997 a genuinely different kind of entry on a date checklist than most first-year coins. Early Silver Britannias were struck in "Britannia silver," a traditional British silver alloy at 0.958 fineness rather than the more common 0.999 standard other national mints used. In 2013, alongside the same purity change made to the gold coin, the Royal Mint raised the silver version to 0.999 fine, bringing it in line with the Silver Eagle, Silver Maple Leaf, and other major 0.999 silver bullion coins.
The 2013 purity change matters less dramatically here than on the gold coin (0.958 to 0.999 is a smaller jump than 22-karat to 24-karat), but it's still worth knowing which era a coin is from, particularly for the 1997 proof-only first year, which is a meaningfully different collecting target than any bullion-strike year. Most new buyers should start with a common post-2013 bullion-strike date for straightforward silver exposure, treating the 1997 proof and other early Britannia-silver-era dates as a separate, more specialized pursuit.
The dates serious Silver Britannia collectors specifically chase — the rest of the run trades close to melt value.
First year of issue, released to mark the 10th anniversary of the Gold Britannia — the first-year coin was proof-only, not a bullion-strike release.
Purity raised from 0.958 ("Britannia silver") to 0.999 fine, the same year the gold version's purity was raised — a coordinated upgrade across both metals.
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Start tracking freeProof-only — the 1997 first-year release had no bullion-strike version, which makes it a different kind of collecting target than most other series' first years.
A traditional British silver alloy at 0.958 fine, used for the Silver Britannia from 1997 to 2012, before the Royal Mint raised it to the more standard 0.999 fine in 2013.
Yes — both were upgraded in 2013, the gold coin from 22-karat to 24-karat and the silver coin from 0.958 to 0.999 fine, a coordinated change across both metals.