Key facts
- Category
- Oxide minerals
- Crystal system
- Cubic
- Color
- Various
- Mohs scale hardness
- 8.0–8.5
- Specific gravity
- 5.6–6.0 g/cm
- Refractive index
- 2.15–2.18
via Wikipedia infobox
Wikidata facts
- Subclass of
- material
- Has part
- zirconium dioxide
- Image
- CZ brilliant.jpg
Show 1 more fact
- different from
- zircon
via Wikidata · CC0
~17 min read
Encyclopedic overview
Cubic zirconia (CZ) is the cubic crystalline form of zirconium dioxide (ZrO2). The synthesized material is hard and usually colorless, but may be made in a variety of different colors. It should not be confused with zircon, which is a zirconium silicate (ZrSiO4). It is sometimes erroneously called cubic zirconium.
Because of its low cost, durability, and close visual likeness to diamond, synthetic cubic zirconia has remained the most gemologically and economically important competitor for diamonds since commercial production began in 1976. Its main competitor as a synthetic gemstone is a more recently cultivated material, synthetic moissanite.
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “cubic zirconia” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.