Australia’s New King Charles III Coin Effigy Revealed!
More than a year after the death of Queen Elizabeth II, The Royal Australian Mint have officially announced the release of their first coins featuring King Charles III.
For the first time in 70 years, and after more than 15.5 billion coins were minted with the face of the late Queen, the Australian $1 coin will feature an effigy of the King.
Credit: AAP
The King’s image
The King’s image that features on these brand new $1 coins will be the official Commonwealth effigy, available for use by all British Commonwealth countries. As with all official portraits of reigning monarchs, the new effigy has been personally approved by King Charles III.
As with our UK coins, this new Australian $1 coin sees the monarch facing the opposite direction to his predecessor, Queen Elizabeth II.
Credit: The Perth Mint
A major change for Australian Coinage
During her reign, six effigies of Queen Elizabeth II have featured on Australian coinage, however the latest change was only 5 years ago. From 1998 to 2018, with the exception of 2000, it was Ian Rank-Broadley’s effigy that featured on Australian coinage.
In 2018, a new effigy of the Queen by Jody Clark was approved and made it’s way onto Australian coins in 2019.
Considering that the Queen Elizabeth effigy only changed fairly recently, the introduction of King Charles III is sure to cause a huge shake up in Australian coinage.
How many will enter circulation?
The final mintage figure of the 2023 Australia $1 is yet to be confirmed, however, The Royal Australian Mint have announced that an estimated 10 million will be circulating by Christmas.
Most Australians will never have held a circulating coin featuring a King on the obverse, so this new issue is guaranteed to attract the attention of not only collectors, but anyone who regularly uses coinage.
The $1 is the only denomination to feature His Majesty at the moment, however The Royal Australian Mint have said that the $2, $5, 10 cent, 20 cent and 50 cent coins will be released gradually next year.
When will we see the King on UK coinage?
Although we’ve already seen the King’s effigy on commemorative UK 50p, £2 and £5 coins since the Queen Elizabeth II Memoriam coin range last year, it’s just been announced that all UK coins are set to change. As the full range of circulating coins from the 1p to the £2 will not only feature the King, but are also set to receive brand new reverse designs.
As perhaps the biggest change we’ve seen to UK coinage in decades, we’re expecting a huge collecting rush for the New UK Coinage for King Charles III and can’t wait to see the new coins when they’re released.
Keep an eye on our social media and website as we’ll be updating you as soon as we have more information on these exciting new coins.
The Commonwealth Effigy of Charles III has been created by the Royal Mint designer and engraver Dan Thorne – his initials appear below the King’s portrait. Dan has also designed the reverse of the King’s 75th birthday UK £5 coin, plus the silver Britannia coins of 2022. There’s an informative article about his work on the Royal Mint website – (https://www.royalmint.com/britannia/britannia-2022/making-a-modern-britannia-meet-product-designer-dan-thorne/)
Just to clarify what happened in the year 2019. The Ian Rank-Broadly 4th effigy was used on Australian coins minted and dated in 2019. The switch to the Jody Clark 6th Effigy was also done on coins minted and dated in 2019. The changeover happened mid year for circulation coins.
Just to clarify what happened in the year 2000, it was only one coin that had the Vladimir Gottwald 5th effigy, a 50 cent commemorative coin, all other coins had the IRB 4th effigy.
Quote “For the first time in 70 years, and after more than 15.5 billion coins were minted with the face of the late Queen, the Australian $1 coin will feature a new effigy.”
Not quite right. There have been 5 Different effigies of Queen Elizabeth II on the Australian $1 coin since 1984.
Arnold Machin 2nd Portrait was on the 1984 $1 coin
Ralph Makleouf 3rd Portrait was on the 1985 to 1998 $1 coin
Ian Rank Broadly 4th Portrait was on the 1999 to 2019 $1 coin
Vladimir Gottwald 5th Portrait was on a couple of NCLT $1 coins in 2010 & 2019
Jody Clark 6th Portrait was on the 2019 to 2023 $1 coin.
However this will be the first Portrait of a King on the Australian $1 coin.
Hi Michael, good spot! We’ve amended that line to be more clear.
Kind regards, Kate