If you have the right $2 bill, it could be worth nearly $5,000 (2024)

WASHINGTON – The venerable $2 bill has been around since the 18th century, yet it long has been seen as somewhat of a stepchild in U.S. currency.

And while it long has had a dubious image, $2 currency remains in circulation. And if you have the right bill – even one of the most recent versions of the $2 bill -- it might fetch you big bucks.

U.S. Currency Auctions has estimated that uncirculated $2 bills from 1890 could sell for $4,500. Uncirculated bills from nearly every year after 1862 to 1917 are estimated to be worth $1,000 or more.

Previously

• These pennies still in circulation could fetch thousands of dollars; Check your pockets
• Bicentennial US quarters can fetch big money; How to tell if you have one
• Check your pockets: These dimes could be worth thousands, and they’re likely in circulation
• Do you have a penny worth up to $200,000? Check your pockets

But newer bills may also carry value.

A $2 bill released in 2003 sold at auction for $2,400, according to Heritage Auction, the world’s largest numismatic auction house. That particular bill had a very low serial number for the 2003 series.

It later was resold for $4,000. Heritage estimates it could be purchased now for $6,000.

Over the years the $2 bill developed a tarnished reputation. Some considered it to be bad luck. Others saw it as a bill that was handed out for ill deeds, such as bribing voters, according to CNN.

The U.S. Treasury tried to popularize the bill in the early 20th century, but that effort failed and for a period, the government stopped issuing new twos.

The bill returned as the United States approached its bicentennial in 1976 and remains in circulation today.

“Many Americans have pretty dubious assumptions about the $2 bill. Nothing happened to the $2 bill. It’s still being made. It’s being circulated,” Heather McCabe, a writer who runs a blog called Two Buckaroo that chronicles her spending with twos and people’s reactions, told CNN. “Americans misunderstand their own currency to the extent they don’t use it.”

The current version carries the face of Thomas Jefferson, primary author of the Declaration of Independence, on the front. On the back is a portrait of the signing of that document.

The aim then was to cut the number of $1 bills in circulation and save the Treasury money on production costs, CNN said. But that relaunch also failed. People hoarded them instead of spending them.

In 2022, there were an estimated 1.5 billion $2 bills in circulation, according to the Federal Reserve. But that accounts for just a tiny fraction of all currency, about $54.1 billion in circulation that year.

More are printed every few years.

The Treasury Department’s Bureau of Engraving and Printing expected to release 204 million new $2 bills in 2022, CNN said.

“It’s a very useful thing to pay for a small amount,” McCabe said.