6 Pence - Elizabeth II 1st portrait without 'BRITT:OMN' (1954–1970)

One row for each year the 6 Pence - Elizabeth II 1st portrait – without 'BRITT:OMN' was struck. Prices are medians of verified sold listings matched to that year from the listing: circulated is worn condition up to Extremely Fine, uncirculated is About Uncirculated or better. A count in brackets means fewer than three sales behind the figure; a grey figure marked "type" is the median across every year, shown where that year has no sale of its own yet; years with no sales yet fill in as sales are recorded. Most types have been searched year by year only since October 2026, so later years are still filling in. Use the grade table below for a price by condition across all years.

About the 1954 6 Pence - Elizabeth II – without 'BRITT:OMN'

The 1954 6 Pence - Elizabeth II – without 'BRITT:OMN' is a circulating 6 pence coin issued from 1954 to 1970, struck in copper-nickel (75% Cu, 25% Ni). It weighs 2.83g and measures 19.3mm across. Reverse design: Tudor rose, shamrock, thistle and leek aligned in a cross, legend above, denomination and date below.

Mintage figures are recorded for 14 years between 1954 and 1967, 1,855,377,100 coins in all. 1959 is the scarcest date, with 93,089,400 struck. It is no longer legal tender (withdrawn 1980), so its value is to collectors only.

Common questions

History and design

From 1954 the sixpence dropped BRITT OMN from the Queen's titles. The Royal Mint explains that the words were omitted owing to the changing status of many Commonwealth territories, and Coins of the UK records the new legend on every sixpence from that year. The same change was made across the denominations, so this is the standard sixpence of the reign.

It was struck every year to 1967, the last date for circulation. Output was heavy throughout: on Coin Hunter's figures every year except 1959 passed 100 million, rising to 240,788,000 in 1967, and the fourteen years total 1,850,593,517. The two references disagree on five dates (1957, 1960, 1962, 1963 and 1966) and the Royal Mint has published no per-year figures, so those rows carry a note.

No sixpences are dated 1968 or 1969. A final 1970 proof was issued in the "Last Lsd" sets marking the end of the old coinage, and Wikipedia gives 750,476 of them.

The obverse is Mary Gillick's laureate portrait of the Queen, with the legend ELIZABETH II DEI GRATIA REGINA. Coins of the UK describes the head as more deeply engraved than on the 1953 coins, whose low-relief portrait had struck weakly.

The reverse is the floral design the Royal Mint credits to Edgar Fuller and Cecil Thomas: a garland of rose, thistle, shamrock and leek, one for each home nation. FID DEF, for Defender of the Faith, runs above, with the denomination and date below. The coin is cupro-nickel with a milled edge.

Collecting notes

Check the legend: if BRITT OMN appears between GRATIA and REGINA the coin is the 1953 sixpence. Otherwise the date is the main thing to read, since all years share one design. With such large mintages, value lies in condition, and full lustre with crisp petals on the rose is the test of a good example.

The 1970 proof belongs to the boxed "Last Lsd" set. Coins of the UK records at least one such set issued with a 1967-dated proof sixpence in error, so a 1967 proof in an original 1970 set is not automatically a later swap.

The sixpence lasted beyond decimalisation as a 2.5 new pence coin. The Royal Mint Museum records that many people regretted it had no place in the decimal coinage, and that it was demonetised in 1980.