Meta title: How Labs Test Jade: FTIR, Raman & Type A Certification Explained Meta description: Home tests can't detect polymer-treated jadeite — labs can. How FTIR finds the polymer signature, how Raman separates jadeite from quartzite, and when lab certification is worth it.
Home tests can take you a surprisingly long way with jade. A flashlight reveals internal structure, a kitchen scale catches glass and plastic, and we've walked through all of it — including what each test can't do — in our guide on how to tell if a jade is real.
But every home test hits the same ceiling: treated jadeite. A Type B bangle is real jadeite that's been acid-bleached and refilled with polymer. It's cold to the touch, dense in the hand, translucent under a flashlight, and it rings when tapped. It passes every test in your kitchen, because in every way your senses can measure, it is jade. What it isn't is natural — and the difference is worth 5x to over 100x in price.
This article is about the machines that catch what your hands can't: what FTIR actually detects, how Raman spectroscopy settles what a green stone really is, and what a lab certificate does and doesn't prove.
Quick Answer: How Do Labs Test Whether Jade Is Real and Untreated?
Labs identify jade in two steps. Raman spectroscopy or refractive index testing confirms the mineral itself — jadeite, nephrite, or an imitation like quartzite. Then FTIR (infrared spectroscopy) checks for treatment: polymer-impregnated Type B jadeite shows telltale absorption bands in the 2,800–3,100 cm⁻¹ region that natural Type A jadeite lacks. Microscopy, UV fluorescence, and specific gravity support both steps. No home method replicates this.
Why Treatment Detection Needs a Machine
The A/B/C grading system exists because treatment is invisible at retail distance. Type B jadeite starts as genuine but low-value material — grayish, impurity-clouded stone that's then soaked in strong acid until the impurities dissolve. The acid leaves the structure porous and brittle, so the stone is impregnated with polymer resin to restore translucency and stability. The result photographs beautifully and handles like fine jade for a few years, until heat and household detergents start breaking the polymer down.
Here's the uncomfortable part: the treatment happens inside the stone. There's no coating to spot, no seam to find, and the density lands close enough to natural jadeite (roughly 2.95–3.15 vs. 3.30–3.36) that even a careful water-displacement test can't rule it out. Dye is sometimes visible under magnification as color webbing along fissures, but polymer impregnation on its own has no reliable visual signature for an untrained eye.
That's the specific problem FTIR was recruited to solve.
FTIR: Reading the Polymer's Fingerprint
FTIR stands for Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy. The principle is simple even if the machine isn't: shine infrared light through or off the stone, and measure which wavelengths get absorbed. Every material absorbs a characteristic pattern — a fingerprint.
Polymers are organic compounds full of carbon-hydrogen bonds, and C-H bonds absorb infrared light in a well-defined zone: roughly 2,800 to 3,100 cm⁻¹ on the spectrum. Jadeite itself, a sodium aluminum silicate, has no business absorbing there. So when a lab runs an FTIR scan and sees strong absorption peaks in that region, the conclusion is direct — there's organic material inside the stone that nature didn't put there.
This method has been standard since the early 1990s, when Type B treatment first flooded the market and GIA researchers published the foundational identification work in Gems & Gemology (Fritsch et al., Fall 1992, "Identification of Bleached and Polymer-Impregnated Jadeite"). Three decades later it remains the workhorse test behind every A货 result on an NGTC certificate.
One nuance separates a good lab from a checkbox: wax. Traditional Type A finishing includes a thin beeswax polish — that's accepted practice and doesn't disqualify a stone from Type A status. Wax also contains C-H bonds and shows weak features in the same spectral neighborhood. The lab's job is distinguishing a faint surface-wax signature from the strong, deep absorption of resin impregnation. This judgment call is exactly why "my friend has a spectrometer" isn't the same as a certificate from an institution that runs thousands of jadeite samples a year.
Raman: Settling What the Stone Actually Is
FTIR answers "has it been treated?" Raman spectroscopy answers the question that comes first: "what is this?"
Raman works by scattering laser light off the stone's crystal lattice; the scattered light shifts in frequency according to the mineral's molecular structure. Jadeite produces its strongest Raman peak near 700 cm⁻¹. Quartz — the mineral behind dyed quartzite, the most common jadeite imposter — peaks near 464 cm⁻¹. The two can look nearly identical in a bangle. On a Raman readout they can't hide from each other for a second.
This matters because the imitation market runs on trade names. "Malaysia jade," "Korean jade," and "new jade" are marketing labels that usually mean dyed quartzite or serpentine — attractive materials, sometimes, but not jadeite and not priced like it. A seller can argue about names all day. A Raman spectrum ends the argument. It also separates jadeite from omphacite and from nephrite, distinctions that matter for how a piece should be certified and described (nephrite is real jade, but it's identified separately — the A/B/C system belongs to jadeite, as we cover in our NGTC vs GIA certification guide).
The Supporting Cast: RI, SG, UV, and the Microscope
No lab hangs a conclusion on a single instrument. Refractive index (jadeite ~1.66) and specific gravity narrow the field cheaply before the spectrometers come out. Longwave UV light makes many resins and glues fluoresce — a fast screening clue, never proof on its own. And the microscope remains the treatment-hunter's oldest tool: acid-bleached Type B stone shows a distinctive etched, spiderweb surface texture where the acid ate along grain boundaries, and dyed Type C material shows color pooling in fractures instead of the gradual "color root" transitions of natural green.
A real lab result is these observations agreeing with each other. When a certificate says 翡翠（A货）, it means the mineral checked out as jadeite and the treatment screen came back clean across methods.
What the Certificate Proves — and What It Doesn't
A lab certificate answers exactly two questions: what the material is, and whether it's been treated. That's authentication, and it's non-negotiable for any serious purchase.
What it doesn't answer is quality. A coarse, opaque bangle can earn the same A货 stamp as an Imperial green cabochon worth a thousand times more; color, translucency, and texture are judged by eyes and markets, not spectrometers. And the certificate itself has to be verified — counterfeit reports with forged accreditation marks sell online for a few yuan, so the paper means nothing until the report number checks out in the lab's own database. The full walkthrough of reading an NGTC report, field by field, and verifying it online is in our NGTC vs GIA guide.
When Is Lab Certification Worth It?
For a piece you already own: any jadeite you'd insure, resell, gift with a claimed value, or simply paid several hundred dollars or more for justifies a lab visit. Testing typically costs far less than the price gap between treated and untreated material, which makes it cheap insurance in both directions — confirming a good purchase or documenting a bad one while you can still act on it.
For a piece you're about to buy: don't pay Type A prices for anything that doesn't already carry a verifiable certificate. The lab work should be the seller's burden, not yours. Every BMjade piece ships with an NGTC certificate — every piece, not selected items — with the report number and anti-counterfeit code verifiable on NGTC's official site before your order even arrives. And we stand behind what the instruments say with a lifetime guarantee: if any reputable gem lab ever finds a BMjade piece to be non-jadeite or treated jadeite, we refund the full order amount plus your testing costs and return shipping. We can offer that because every piece has already been through the machines this article describes.
If you're comparing certified pieces, browse our certified Type A jadeite jewelry.
FAQ
What is FTIR jade testing?
FTIR (Fourier-transform infrared spectroscopy) detects organic materials inside a stone. Polymer-impregnated Type B jadeite shows strong C-H absorption bands around 2,800–3,100 cm⁻¹ that natural Type A jadeite lacks, making FTIR the standard test for separating natural from treated jadeite.
Can FTIR alone prove jade is real?
No. FTIR detects treatment, but confirming the mineral is jadeite in the first place requires Raman spectroscopy or refractive index testing. Labs combine multiple methods before issuing a Type A conclusion.
Can a lab detect Type B jadeite that passes home tests?
Yes, reliably. Type B jadeite defeats touch, weight, sound, and flashlight tests because the polymer sits inside the stone, but its infrared absorption signature is unambiguous under FTIR, often supported by the acid-etched surface texture visible under a microscope.
How does a lab tell jadeite from dyed quartzite?
Raman spectroscopy: jadeite's main peak sits near 700 cm⁻¹, quartz near 464 cm⁻¹. Trade names like "Malaysia jade" or "new jade" usually describe dyed quartzite, and a Raman scan resolves the question regardless of what the seller calls it.
How much does jade lab testing cost, and is it worth it?
Costs vary by lab and item, but testing is typically a small fraction of the price difference between treated and untreated jadeite, which runs 5x to over 100x. For any piece worth several hundred dollars or more, certification is cheap insurance.
Does a Type A certificate mean the jade is valuable?
No. Type A confirms natural, untreated jadeite; it says nothing about quality. Color, translucency, and texture determine value — a certified low-grade piece is still low-grade. Read the certificate for authenticity, then judge the stone.
