After more than 230 years, the Mint has stopped making pennies. Here’s what that means for Katy shoppers and businesses
By Staff Writer | For The Katy News
A penny press is seen at the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia, Wednesday, Nov. 12, 2025. (AP Photo/Matt Slocum)
KATY, Texas — The little copper coin rattling around in your cup holder is finally clocking out.
On November 12, 2025, the U.S. Mint in Philadelphia struck the final batch of circulating pennies, officially ending a 232-year production run of the one-cent coin. The decision, made by the U.S. Treasury earlier this year, means no new pennies will be made for everyday use going forward.
The penny is not “canceled” as money. It remains legal tender, and the billions of pennies already in jars, drawers and cash registers will continue to circulate for years. But once those coins leave the system or end up in collections, they won’t be replaced with fresh ones.
Why the penny is ending
The main reason is simple: the penny costs more than it’s worth.
In recent years, it has cost close to four cents in metal, labor and distribution to make a single one-cent coin. That added up to tens of millions of dollars in losses each year for a coin that many people don’t bother to pick up off the ground.
At the same time, pennies were taking up a big share of the Mint’s workload. Even though the coin barely buys anything on its own, it made up a large percentage of all the coins the Mint produced. Ending production lets the government save money and focus resources on coins people actually use.
What this means at the register
For Katy shoppers, the biggest change will show up with cash, not cards.
Most stores are expected to handle prices the way other countries that dropped their smallest coins already do: by rounding the final total for cash purchases to the nearest five cents when pennies aren’t available.
That usually looks like this:
• Totals ending in 1¢ or 2¢ are rounded down to 0¢.
• Totals ending in 3¢ or 4¢ are rounded up to 5¢.
If you pay with a debit or credit card, or a mobile wallet like Apple Pay or Google Pay, you’ll still be charged the exact price down to the penny. The rounding only comes into play when physical coins are involved.
Katy shoppers may also notice more “exact change appreciated” or “no pennies given in change” signs appearing at local businesses as registers are reprogrammed and coin supplies are used up.
What about all the pennies at home?
If you’ve got coffee cans, jars or drawers full of pennies, you don’t have to rush to get rid of them.
You can:
• Roll and deposit them at your bank.
• Spend them slowly at local businesses that still accept and count pennies.
• Donate them to schools, churches or local charities that run coin drives or fundraisers.
Because existing pennies remain legal tender, they will hold their face value for the foreseeable future. Some special dates and error coins may even gain value among collectors over time.
A tiny coin with a big story
First authorized in the 1790s and later redesigned to feature President Abraham Lincoln, the penny has been part of American life for generations. From penny candy and piggy banks to “a penny saved is a penny earned,” it has carried more cultural weight than its small value suggests.
Now, as digital payments and rising costs push the penny off the production line, the coin moves from everyday pocket change into the history books.
For Katy, it means one less coin to juggle at the checkout counter — and one more reminder of how even the smallest pieces of our money tell a big story about how the country changes over time.
