Two of the most popular choices for centre stone in diamond engagement rings are, princess cut and round cut. But, the price of the former is lesser compared to the latter even though they have comparable brilliance and sparkle. This difference in their price is due to their shapes, and the ease with which they can be cut from rough diamond. Even modified designs of the princess cut such as princess cut halo diamond rings are more affordable. So, one must be thinking why is this so?
Saving Due To Less Wastage
The big reason for the difference in the price between princess cut and round cut diamonds is due the amount of rough diamond preserved after diamond cut. Princess cut saves around 80% to 90% of the rough diamonds, i.e. if you cut a 1 carat rough diamond, you get a 0.90 to 0.80 carat princess cut diamond. Whereas, in round cut cutting a 1 carat rough diamond will give 0.40 carat of round cut diamond. Hence, the wastage is less in princess cut diamonds resulting in a lower price.
Labour Cost
It is much easier to chisel out a symmetrically square princess cut diamond from the rough diamond, and hence the labour cost is low. While, a round cut diamond requires more effort to chisel out a perfect round cut diamond reducing the wastage to minimum. This is because it has 58 facets that brilliantly capture the light, increasing its brilliance and sparkle compared to princess cut. This results in a general higher price tag for round cut diamonds.
Hiding Flaws
In princess cut diamond rings it is much easier to hide the flaws at the tip of the square shape and can be achieved by using a prong setting. Whereas, in round cut diamond rings it is impossible to hide the flaws and adjustments to hide the blemishes is very difficult. Because of this, princess cut diamonds with limited flaws are cheaper than better round cut diamonds.
The Demand
The other reason round cut diamond rings are more expensive than princess cut diamond rings such as princess halo diamond ring is that the former has higher demand. This is because it is more popular and some of the most famous diamond engagement and wedding rings belong to this category. Also it gives generally bigger size appearance for the same carat weight and looks bigger on the finger.
These are some of the reasons princess cut diamond rings are cheaper than round cut diamond rings.