Star Note Value: What the Star Means and Which Are Rare

When a printed sheet is found defective after serial numbers have been printed, the Bureau of Engraving and Printing replaces it with a sheet from a separate star run so the numbering sequence stays complete. The star note carries its own serial number with a star where the suffix letter would be. Every denomination and series can have star notes.

BEP publishes monthly production reports listing how many star notes were printed per series, denomination and Federal Reserve Bank block. Third-party lookup sites turn those reports into a search by serial number. Collectors generally pay attention to runs of a few hundred thousand notes or fewer; a run of several million is treated as common. This page does not query print runs.

A star does not mean the note is an error, a misprint or a special issue, and it does not prove the note is genuine. Condition still matters: a worn star note from a large run is an ordinary bill.

Most star notes found in circulation are worth face value, because many come from large runs (GovMint). Two things lift the price: a small print run and a crisp, unfolded note. My Currency Collection gives 640,000 notes as the usual line below which collectors treat a star as scarce; common runs are 320,000, 640,000, 1,280,000 and 2,560,000, and 3,200,000 is the maximum. Older series are a different market. Greysheet (September 25, 2026) examples, worn to top grade:

• 1957 $1 silver certificate star: $2–$160
• 1935A $1 R experimental star: $1,400–$25,000
• 1928-D $1 silver certificate star: $1,000–$100,000
• 1976 $2 star: $5–$45 for most banks, $40–$200 Richmond, $85–$175 Kansas City
• 1934B $10 silver certificate star: $600–$20,000

There are two kinds of modern star notes, and they look identical. Sheet stars replace whole sheets before cutting, are usually printed in runs of 640,000 or fewer and reach circulation scattered. Pack stars replace damaged packs of 100 after cutting and run from 1.28 million to 3.2 million notes; these are the stars sold in bulk online. Only a lookup of the run tells you which you have (My Currency Collection).

On current Federal Reserve Notes the star replaces the suffix letter at the end of the serial (BEP). On older notes such as silver certificates the star usually comes before the digits, as in *75681423A (US Currency Auctions). Both mean the same thing.

Series 2013 $1 New York star notes with serials B00000001* to B00250000* or B03200001* to B09600000* were printed in Washington, D.C. in 2014 and the same numbers were printed again in Fort Worth. A matched pair sold for $25,000 on October 9, 2022, and only 11 pairs had been confirmed by September 2021 (Coin World).

Research and drafting for this page were assisted by AI and checked line by line against the sources listed below. Prices are copied from the named price guide or dealer page with its date; where a figure could not be confirmed we say so rather than estimate. If you find an error, tell us and we will correct it.