Who owns metal detecting finds in England?

Last updated: 17 October 2026

Finding something is not the same as keeping it. Who owns a find depends on what it is: potential treasure belongs to the Crown and must be reported; a recently-lost item still belongs to its owner; and most other finds — because detectorists dig them up — belong to the landowner by default. The one thing that settles it cleanly is a written agreement with the landowner before you start.

Does finding it make it yours?

No — "finders keepers" is not the law. Whether you can keep a find depends on what the object is and on whether you had permission to be there. There is no single statute that settles who owns an ordinary non-treasure find; the nearest plain summary is HM Revenue & Customs' Capital Gains Manual, which draws the rules together from decided cases. It is written for tax purposes and is not a full statement of property law, but it sets out the order clearly: the original owner has the best title; if the find is treasure it belongs to the Crown; otherwise it comes down to the finder or the landowner, decided mainly by whether the object lay on the surface or was buried — and a trespasser has no claim at all.

Who owns what — by type of find

Ownership is best thought of by the kind of find, not by "finder versus farmer". This is the order that decides it:

One thread runs through all of it: every claim above assumes you were on the land with permission. If you detect without it, you are trespassing, and a trespassing finder has no claim to anything — so permission is not just courtesy, it is what gives you any standing over a find at all.

Buried finds (most detecting finds)

Almost everything a detectorist recovers is dug out of the ground. For a non-treasure object found beneath the surface, the better claim goes to the landowner. HMRC's manual puts it plainly — an object below the surface belongs to the landowner — and the courts have long agreed: a prehistoric boat buried six feet down went to the landowner in Elwes v Brigg Gas Co, and in the detecting case Waverley Borough Council v Fletcher a detectorist who dug up a buried medieval brooch in a public park lost it to the council, whose land it was — the digging was treated as trespass.

So the honest default for detecting is that the finds you dig belong to the landowner unless you have agreed otherwise. That is exactly why detectorists and landowners settle a split in advance, in writing — it turns a legal default into a clear, shared understanding.

Finds lying on the surface

A non-treasure object found unattached, lying on the surface can belong to the lawful finder rather than the landowner — the classic example is Bridges v Hawksworth, where banknotes dropped on a shop floor went to the person who found them. Two caveats matter for detectorists, though. First, very little of what you detect is truly "on the surface" — you dig for it, which puts it in the buried category above. Second, HMRC's neat "surface versus buried" line is a simplification: the real legal test is whether the object was in or attached to the land or merely lying on it, and even then the finder's claim only stands if they were there lawfully. Without permission, the surface rule does not help you at all.

Something recently lost

Occasionally a find is simply someone's recently-lost property — a modern wedding ring, a dropped set of keys, an engraved or identifiable item. The original owner keeps the best title to it, ahead of both finder and landowner. If there is any realistic chance of returning it, the right course — in law and in good conscience — is to report it or hand it in (to the police, or to the landowner), not to keep it.

Potential treasure

If a find might be treasure, ownership is not yours to decide: treasure belongs to the Crown, and by law you must report it to the coroner within 14 days. Treasure is defined by the Treasure Act 1996 — broadly, qualifying precious-metal objects and coin groups, and since 30 July 2023, finds of exceptional historical importance even if they aren't gold or silver. If a find feels genuinely important, treat it as potential treasure. The full definition, the 2023 change and the penalties for not reporting are set out in our guide to the metal detecting laws in England.

Rewards — does the finder get half?

Not automatically. There is no fixed 50/50 rule. If a museum wishes to acquire a piece of treasure, the independent Treasure Valuation Committee commissions a valuation and recommends the market value and how any reward is shared — usually between the finder and the landowner. How it splits depends on your agreement and the circumstances, and detecting without permission, or failing to report, can reduce or forfeit your share. A written agreement that settles the split up front is what protects it.

What a written finds agreement covers

Nearly all of the uncertainty above disappears with a short written permission agreement, signed before you search. A good one sets out who owns the finds, how any reward or sale proceeds are split, and what happens with treasure — so the surface-versus-buried question never has to be argued. It protects both sides, and it is the single most useful thing a detectorist and a landowner can do together. Our guide to asking a landowner for permission walks through how to raise it, with a free printable agreement you can fill in together.

Common questions

Official sources

This page is a plain-language summary — not legal advice, and not a substitute for the sources themselves. Ownership of found objects is a genuinely complex area of law, much depends on the facts, and the legal responsibility is yours. Always verify against the official sources.