Royal Shield 10p (2008 to 2022)

The shield 10p was struck in huge quantities, and circulated coins of every date trade at face value. Premiums are limited to coins made for collectors. The 2018 and 2019 shield 10ps were not struck for circulation at all and come only from annual sets, so they sell above face value in their packs or as loose set coins. Brilliant uncirculated coins of the other years also sell to collectors building date runs, and condition matters most for them.

With 1,668,141,996 struck for circulation, the Royal Shield 10p is the 28th rarest of the 30 ranked 10p designs and has the 183rd lowest mintage of all 194 circulating UK designs. That puts it in the Common band, for mintages 10,000,000 or more.

The next rarer 10p is the Capercaillie 10p, with 7,100,000 struck, and the next more common is the Crowned Lion (NEW PENCE) 10p, with 1,768,538,250 struck.

Its lowest circulation mintage was in 2012, with 11,600,030 struck.

Look for the top left corner of a shield with two lions of England, TEN PENCE along the top edge and no beaded border. The shield runs off the rim, so only part of it is shown, and the initials MD sit on this side. Dates run from 2008 to 2022. Coins dated 2011 onwards are nickel-plated steel and are magnetic, while the cupro-nickel coins of 2008 to 2010 are not. The 2015 date comes with either Ian Rank-Broadley's or Jody Clark's portrait.

The Royal Mint launched an open competition in August 2005 to redesign the reverse of every circulating coin bar the £2 coin, and Matthew Dent's entry was revealed as the winner in April 2008. His idea was to divide the Royal Shield of Arms between the six smallest coins, from the 1p up to the 50p, so that laid together they rebuild the shield, which the round £1 coin showed whole. The 10p takes the top left corner: part of the first quarter, with two of the lions passant guardant of England, running off the edge of the coin. TEN PENCE follows the top of the rim and Dent's initials MD appear on this side. The beaded border that had framed the lion 10p was dropped from both faces. The new coins reached circulation from mid-2008 in cupro-nickel, and from the 2011 date the 10p was made in nickel-plated steel, with the 2011 coins held back until January 2012. Jody Clark's portrait of the Queen replaced Ian Rank-Broadley's in 2015. The last shield 10ps are dated 2022, and the Charles III designs unveiled in 2023 replaced the set.