Has gold been found near you? Probably.

Very likely. Gold has been documented in nearly every US state — the federal record (USGS MRDS) holds 46,392 recorded gold occurrences and 21,562 past or active producers across the American West alone. The fastest way to know for sure is to check the recorded occurrences around your own location on a live map.

Use the location button on this page — your browser asks permission, then the live map centers on where you are and shows every recorded gold occurrence, active mining claim, creek and road around you. Your location is used only in your browser, never sent to us.

The easy gold is long gone, but erosion keeps feeding placer gold into creeks below every recorded source, and small-scale prospectors still find color on documented ground every season. The record can't promise what remains in any one creek — what it can do is point you at ground where gold demonstrably was, which beats guessing every time.

It depends on the state and who manages the land. Casual hand panning is allowed in many national forests and on much BLM land, while some states and specific rivers require a permit for anything beyond a pan. Always check with the managing agency for the exact ground you're on — and know whose ground it is before you start. That last part is exactly what a land-ownership layer is for.

No — and this is the mistake that gets people in trouble. Even on public land, an active mining claim gives someone else the exclusive right to the minerals, and some areas are withdrawn from mineral entry entirely. Checking the active-claims layer before you dig is the difference between a good day and a bad conversation.