- Engagement ring trends evolve year after year.
- Private jeweler Anna P. Jay said elongated stones and thicker bands will be popular in 2025.
- Colorful stones and personalized details are on the rise, too.
The holiday season is in full swing, which means engagement season is, too.
And as the first proposals of the year roll in, we'll get a peek at the engagement rings that will be big in the coming months.
Business Insider spoke to private jeweler and jewelry store owner Anna P. Jay about the engagement ring trends that will be everywhere in 2025.
Elongated shapes will be popular in 2025.
Jay told BI that elongated-shaped stones, including emerald, oval, pear, and marquise-shaped, are becoming more popular.
"Elongated shapes are great because they visually trick the eye into appearing larger," Jay told BI of their appeal.
"I've started to do a lot of pear engagement rings all of a sudden. They're kind of the next step from oval," she said. "And then I think marquise is going to follow."
Recent celebrity engagement rings match Jay's predictions. For instance, in December 2024, Benny Blanco proposed to Selena Gomez with a marquise diamond.
People are embracing color in their engagement rings.
Diamonds will always be popular for engagement rings, but other stones are also becoming go-to's, Jay told BI.
"People are not shying away from diamonds, but I think that we're starting to see more color," Jay said.
Sapphires, rubies, and emeralds are often popular for colorful engagement rings because they're durable. Jay said people are getting more creative with their tinted stones, too, particularly with toi-et-moi rings.
"Over the summer, I did a toi-et-moi where I said, 'Bring me a color that you like,' and we matched the stone, which ended up being a tourmaline, to the color of eelgrass for a client."
"We're allowing ourselves a little bit more creativity, a little bit more flexibility to get the look that we want using colored stones," she added.
Bands are getting thicker.
"The 80s are back in a very big way," Jay said, which she said means many people are opting for "bigger and chunkier" bands.
Thicker bands are as stylish as they are practical. They are typically more stable than the thin bands popular in 2023 and 2024.
"The conversation I have with my clients is like, 'You're going to wear this for the rest of your life. While we love a dainty band now, it's going to be a headache long term,'" Jay said, adding that making a band even slightly thicker can be beneficial.
"If we can add tenths of millimeters, you're visually not going to be able to tell a difference, but structurally, it's going to be much more sound," she told BI.
Yellow gold settings are still popular, but you might also see more white gold.
Yellow gold has become common for many people's engagement bands, but Jay anticipates white gold and silver will be on the rise in the coming year.
"I think it's going to take two or three more years, but I think we are edging toward more white and silver," Jay said. "Gold is becoming…expensive."
She added that the increase in the cost of gold had led people to wear sterling silver for day-to-day jewelry, making it more likely to select a white gold, platinum, or silver band for their engagement rings to match.
And no matter the design, people will prioritize their center stones.
Jay also told BI that people will invest their money into a center stone rather than selecting rings with multiple stones, which she said gives them the flexibility to reset the setting over time.
"If you ever did want to reset it, you could add side stones or put it in a chunkier setting or something like that," she said.
Jay told BI that it's also easier for people to stack other rings with their engagement and wedding rings down the road when they're simpler.
"Consider making your wedding band just a gold or platinum solid band so that you do have that flexibility in the future to stack and play with and make it a little more fun and playful," she advised.
