How can you tell the difference between a real diamond and cubic zirconia?
Get a hold of a long-wave ultraviolet light (black light). Diamonds will usually glow blue and cubic zirconia will glow mustard yellow,. Another way to tell the difference between a CZ and a real diamond is to look at the CZ under a 10x magnification. One can see that the facets do not point properly, and where facets intersect, it is not a straight line, but the intersection is more rounded than the diamond’s facets. Other ways to tell the difference are doing a specific gravity test on an un-mounted stone, marking ink on the top of the stone (the ink beads up on a CZ), when gem-printed a CZ photograph’s reflective and refractive patterns, and when measuring heat conductivity, a CZ registers red on the indicator (a diamond is green).
