Gemstone Chip Beads
Chips are made from premium off-cuts when cutting cabochons and other shapes. It is a great way to incorporate high quality stones with minimal investment. They are simply tumbled, minimally processed, and left with their organic shapes.
Products: 93
Black Tourmaline 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16-Inch
Black Tourmaline is a black crystalline aluminum borosilicate mineral with occasional light gray inclusions that appear as flecks or veins. Tourmal...
View full detailsTanzanite 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16-Inch
Tanzanite is both extremely rare and extremely attractive, and we offer it when we can.
Strawberry Quartz 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16-Inch
Strawberry Quartz is a translucent, milky to pink silicon dioxide mineral. Its needle to like inclusions of hematite are iridescent red. Quartz has...
View full detailsBlue Apatite 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16-Inch
Blue Apatite ranges in color from light teal to blue to bright blue to dark blue to green. It can be easily confused with other minerals due to its...
View full detailsRuby Zoisite 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16-Inch
Ruby Zoisite occurs naturally when small Ruby crystals become embedded within Zoisite. The Ruby inclusions in this stone are pink to reddish purple...
View full detailsLapis 8x20mm Faceted Teeth - 9 Inch
Lapis is a semi to precious stone and one of the most sought after throughout history. It is highly regarded for its beautiful blue color flecked w...
View full detailsAmazonite 8x18mm Faceted Teeth - 9 Inch
Brazilian Amazonite is an opaque blue to green to light green stone, often occurring with inclusions of white, yellow or gray and occasionally tran...
View full detailsGreen Amethyst 8x20mm Faceted Teeth - 9 Inch
Amethyst is a beautiful stone (normally purple), known as a “Gem of Fire” by ancient cultures. It has been greatly sought after throughout history ...
View full detailsLemon Quartz 8x16mm Faceted Teeth - 9 Inch
Lemon Quartz is a trade name for color-enhanced yellow quartz. Gamma ray irradiation, followed by a mild heat treatment gives it the bright yellow ...
View full detailsGreen Kyanite 5-10x22-30mm Teeth - 15-16 Inch
Kyanite often occurs as long, bladed, striated crystals, transparent or translucent with a pearly luster. An aluminum silicate mineral, it may appe...
View full detailsHypersthene 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16 Inch
Hypersthene is often categorized as enstatite or ferrosilite, but its identity is complicated. Pure enstatite contains no iron, and pure ferrosilit...
View full detailsCanadian Jade 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16 Inch
Canadian Jade is the trade name for this stone that ranges in color from light to dark green, with small, dark specks or veins. This material is ac...
View full detailsCharoite 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16 Inch
Charoite is a stone that naturally occurs in intense purple hues, as well as grays, browns, greenish yellows, white and black. These colors swirl t...
View full detailsRhodochrosite 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16 Inch
Rhodochrosite is a bubblegum pink to rose red stone, with occasional inclusions of creamy white and dark grey. A manganese carbonate material of th...
View full detailsAmetrine 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16 Inch
Ametrine is quartz that occurs in bands of purple and yellow. As the name suggests, it is a combination of Amethyst and Citrine. The different colo...
View full detailsAquamarine 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16 Inch
Aquamarine is a transparent to translucent stone ranging from cerulean blue to light blue in higher grades. In lower grades it can be transparent t...
View full detailsPink Opal 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16 Inch
Pink Opal is a variety of non to precious opal, meaning that it has lustre and some translucency without the fire or color play associated with pre...
View full detailsAustralian Chrysoprase 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16 Inch
Chrysoprase is a bright apple green, translucent stone, whose color often caused ancient jewelers to confuse it with Emerald. A cryptocrystalline C...
View full detailsSeraphinite 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16 Inch
Seraphinite's chatoyancy (optical reflectance) gives it a feathery appearance associated with angels (also known as seraphim.) Seraphinite is most ...
View full detailsKunzite 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16 Inch
Kunzite was named after a former Tiffany & Co. vice president, famed mineralogist and jeweler George Frederick Kunz, who first catalogued the s...
View full detailsBlue Lace Agate 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16 Inch
Blue Lace Agate is a naturally occuring soft blue agate, laced with bands or swirls of brighter blue, periwinkle, white and occasionally gray or br...
View full detailsBlue Kyanite 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16 Inch
Kyanite often occurs as long, bladed, striated crystals, transparent or translucent with a pearly luster. An aluminum silicate mineral, it may appe...
View full detailsTourmaline 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16 Inch
Tourmaline is classified as a semiprecious stone and occurs in a vast array of colors, everything from colorless to black, from pastel to bright to...
View full detailsMalachite 5x10-20mm Top Drill Teeth - 15-16 Inch
Malachite is a copper carbonate with a bright green color and dark green banding. Usually found near copper deposits, it is formed through the comb...
View full detailsAbout this cut
Frequently asked questions
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What is a chip bead?
A chip bead is an irregular, freeform gemstone bead — drilled rough or tumble-polished fragments rather than calibrated geometry. Each bead varies in size, profile, and surface, so a strand reads as a natural, organic texture rather than a uniform shape. Most chips are tumble-polished to a smooth, rounded finish, though edges and proportions still differ bead to bead. Drilling is typically through the longest axis, but hole placement varies. Because chips are cut from offcut material and small rough, they're an efficient way to work a stone into a design without paying for calibrated bead yield. -
What sizes does Dakota stock in chips?
Chip sizing is approximate by nature — the tag describes a working range rather than a calibrated measurement. Dakota's chip strands cluster around 8mm (the deepest size pool), with strong stock at 5mm, 6mm, 7mm, and 9mm. Larger irregular ranges like 5x10–20mm and 6–9mm are stocked for designs that want more variation between beads. Bead-to-bead variance within a single strand is expected and is part of how chip strands look. Exact size range, drill, and approximate bead count should be disclosed — ask before buying if it isn't specified. -
What stones come in chip form?
Dakota carries chips in roughly 185 active SKUs. Turquoise is by far the deepest pool at 42 strands, followed by opal (13), quartz (10), mixed-gemstone strands (10), tourmaline (7), Australian opal (6), amazonite (6), kyanite (6), jasper (5), and amethyst (5). Chips are common in stones where calibrated bead yield is low or where the rough is too included or too small for round work — which is why tourmaline, kyanite, and opal show up here. Treatment varies by stone and should be disclosed. -
What jewelry uses chip beads best?
Chips are a workhorse for stretch bracelets, multi-strand necklaces, fringe, tassels, and memory-wire pieces where organic texture matters more than precise repetition. They layer well under or between calibrated rounds and rondelles, adding visual movement without dominating a design. Mixed-gemstone chip strands work for color-story pieces and beach/boho lines. Chips also weave well into bead embroidery and kumihimo, and because beads vary in size, you can hand-pick larger or smaller pieces from a strand for focal placement. -
How are chip strands drilled and strung?
Drill orientation on chip beads is not uniform — holes are typically placed through the longest stable axis of each fragment, but the angle varies bead to bead. That means chips do not sit predictably on a stringing wire the way calibrated beads do, which is part of their visual character. Hole size also varies within a strand. For stretch cord.7mm or 1mm elastic is usually safe; for beading wire.014–.019 covers most strands. If a project needs consistent hole size, ask before buying.