Tungsten has the highest melting point of any metal, 3,422°C, it is as dense as gold, and as tungsten carbide it is almost as hard as diamond. That is why it ends up in the cutting tools, drill bits and armour that shape everything else. The market is small, China makes about 79% of it, it is one of the 3TG conflict minerals, and in 2025 China's export controls roughly doubled the price. 2025 (USGS) · Compiled June 2026
Tungsten mined 2025
85 kt
a small, strategic market
China's share
79%
about 67 of 85 kt
Melting point
3,422°C
the highest of any metal
US mine output
0
none mined since 2015
Where the World's Tungsten Is Mined (2025)
Colour intensity shows each country's share of tungsten mine production. Hover a country for its tonnage. China makes about 79% of it. Vietnam, the new Boguty mine in Kazakhstan, Russia and a scatter of others share what is left.
Lower shareHigher share
2025 Tungsten Mine Production by Country (kt)
China makes about 67,000 tonnes, more than twenty times the next producer. Vietnam, Kazakhstan, North Korea, Russia and Bolivia split a thin remainder. There is no large alternative source.
And China Holds Most of the Reserves (kt)
It is not just current mining. China holds about 2.5 million of the world's roughly 4.7 million tonnes of reserves, over half. Australia, Russia and Vietnam are the next largest, a long way back.
Why tungsten is extreme, made tangible.
Tungsten exists in tools and armour because of four numbers. It melts hotter than any other metal, it is as dense as gold, its carbide is nearly as hard as diamond, and almost all of it comes from one country. Verify-and-cite figures in the footer.
3,422°C
highest melting point
Tungsten melts hotter than any other metal, which is why it glowed in light-bulb filaments for a century.
19.25
g/cm³, as dense as gold
A block of tungsten weighs almost exactly the same as the same block of gold. It is one of the densest metals there is.
~9
Mohs, near diamond
Tungsten carbide scores about 9 on the Mohs scale, just below diamond at 10, so it cuts and drills almost everything else.
79%
mined in China
Despite all that performance, supply is the weak point: about 79% of tungsten is mined in a single country.
The Metal That Won't Melt (melting point, °C)
This is the property tungsten is famous for. At 3,422°C it melts far hotter than molybdenum, steel or aluminium, hotter than any other metal. That is why it survives inside jet engines, furnace parts, rocket nozzles and the tip of a welding electrode.
Where Tungsten Goes
Most tungsten becomes cemented carbide: tungsten carbide grains glued with cobalt into the inserts on drill bits, milling tools and saw tips. The rest goes into hard steels and superalloys, into filaments, electrodes and wire, and into chemicals. Split is approximate, US-weighted (USGS).
It Is a Cutting-Tool Metal
Group it up and one job dominates: making the tools that machine everything else. Cemented carbide alone is about 60% of demand. Tungsten is the metal industry uses to shape other metals.
The Tool Behind the Tools
Tungsten's value is hardness that survives heat. Bonded with cobalt into cemented carbide, it forms the cutting edges on drill bits, lathe tools, milling cutters and mining picks, the parts that machine, bore and shape almost every other manufactured thing. It also strengthens high-speed and tool steels and the superalloys in jet engines, and because it is so dense it goes into armour, armour-piercing rounds and counterweights. For a century it was the glowing filament in light bulbs. So tungsten rarely appears in the final product you buy, but it is in the tool that made it. That quiet, upstream role is exactly why a supply squeeze matters, which is the next tab.
China's production share
79%
of world tungsten mining
China's reserves share
53%
about 2.5 of 4.7 Mt
Conflict-mineral status
3TG
tin, tantalum, tungsten, gold
2025 price move
~2x
after China's export controls
How Concentrated Tungsten Supply Is (% of world)
China is about 79% of mining and 53% of reserves, the top two producers about 82%, and the top five about 90%. As with the other 3TG metals, the chokepoint is one country, and the rest of the world has little spare capacity.
The Price When China Tightened (Rotterdam concentrate, USD per mtu)
Prices were flat near $250 per metric ton unit for years. In February 2025 China imposed export controls on selected tungsten items and the US raised tariffs to 50%. Concentrate jumped to about $380, and APT roughly doubled toward $675 through the year.
The Supply-and-Risk Story
Tungsten is a small market with an outsized grip on industry. The world mines only about 85,000 tonnes a year, yet that metal sharpens the tools that make almost everything else. Supply is heavily concentrated: China mines about 79% and holds over half the reserves, and it is one of the four 3TG conflict minerals (tin, tantalum, tungsten, gold) that companies must trace from mine to product. The leverage became explicit in February 2025, when China placed export controls on selected tungsten items and the United States raised tariffs to 50%. Prices that had sat flat for years roughly doubled. The United States has not mined tungsten since 2015, though new projects in Nevada, Canada and Kazakhstan are now funded. That is the tungsten question: the hardest metal to work with depends on the one country willing to control its export.
Why It Matters
Tungsten is the metal that makes other metals workable. Almost nothing in a factory gets cut, drilled or milled without a tungsten carbide edge, because tungsten keeps its hardness at temperatures that would soften steel. It has the highest melting point of any metal, it is as dense as gold, and its carbide is nearly as hard as diamond. That is why it sits in cutting tools, jet engines, drill bits and armour. The catch is supply. The market is tiny, about 85,000 tonnes a year, and one country mines roughly 79% of it and holds most of the reserves. Tungsten is one of the 3TG conflict minerals, and in 2025 China showed what concentration means by restricting exports, doubling the price. So the tungsten question is not about running out. It is that the metal industry relies on to shape everything else can be turned on and off by a single supplier.