Limits

This is not medical advice and it is not a test of any object. It reads a text field a seller typed. If you have a diagnosed metal allergy, the people to ask are your doctor and the seller — in that order.

It is reading a sales listing, not the metal

Nothing here has touched, tested, or seen any item. The verdict comes from words in a materials field which is optional, free text, and written by someone whose job is to sell the thing. It can be incomplete, out of date, copied from another listing, or simply wrong.

The four ways it is wrong

Safe-looking, not safe.

A listing says sterling silver and the ear wire is plated. A listing says titanium about the post and nothing about the rest. Materials fields describe the headline metal, not every component, and the component that matters for a reaction is whichever one is against your skin the longest.

Risky-looking, actually fine.

A seller writes brass backing card, or lists the packaging, or mentions a metal they no longer use. Everything containing a risky word is called not for me with no attempt to work out which part it refers to, because guessing in that direction is the guess that hurts.

“Nickel free” means different things.

Sometimes the whole piece. Very often just the earring post. Occasionally it means “nickel free by EU standards”, which is a release-rate limit rather than an absence. That is why a named risky metal always beats the claim here.

Surgical steel is a judgement call, not a fact.

316L contains nickel, sealed into the alloy. Most people who react to plated jewellery are fine with it and some are not. It is never counted as looks safe, and whether it counts for you is a setting rather than a default.

What it cannot see at all

• Coatings and finishes that are not mentioned.
• Glue, solder and findings — clasps, jump rings, butterfly backs — which are frequently a different metal from the piece and frequently unlisted.
• Other allergens. This looks for nickel and the metals that usually carry it. It says nothing about cobalt, chromium, resin, latex, or anything else you might react to.
• Whether a seller edited the listing before you ordered. Kept listings are re-read once a day, so there is up to a day of lag — and a seller can change the description after you order, or send something different from what is described.

What it is genuinely good for

Two things, both narrow and both real:

1. Getting the obviously-not-for-you results out of the way. Most costume jewellery searches are mostly plated brass. Sorting that to the bottom saves opening thirty listings to find the two worth reading properly.
2. Noticing that a listing changed its own description. That is the thing no amount of care at the time of saving can protect you from, because it happens afterwards, and Etsy neither notifies about it nor keeps a visible history.

Both of those end with you reading the listing yourself and asking the seller. This is a filter and a watchman, not an answer.

If you react to something anyway

Stop wearing it, and talk to a doctor or pharmacist — not to this website. If a listing here was wrong in a way worth knowing about, tell me; a wrong verdict is worth more to me than a compliment, and the word lists are on one page precisely so they can be argued with.