Gold ETFs compared: UTI, Quantum, ICICI Prudential, LIC

Same metal, four wrappers

A gold ETF holds physical gold, lists on the stock exchange and publishes a NAV every day. Each unit stands for a small, set quantity of gold, so two gold ETFs should move almost exactly together. Whatever separates them comes down to cost and to small day-to-day differences in how each NAV is struck.

This post puts four of them side by side: UTI's, Quantum's, ICICI Prudential's and LIC MF's. Returns are on NAV, from daily NAVs to Friday 9 October 2026, compounded a year for periods over one year. Expense ratios are the latest in AMFI's TER disclosure; assets are AMFI's average for July to September 2026; launch dates are the allotment dates in each fund's summary document.

The numbers

Our NAV record for ICICI Prudential's ETF is continuous only from July 2018, and LIC MF's runs from 31 July 2023 under its current scheme code, so neither has a figure for the longer periods. LIC MF split its units 100 for 1 on 6 March 2026 and Quantum 50 for 1 in December 2021; the returns above allow for both.

UTI's 21.80% was the highest one-year return of any gold ETF with a year's record, and LIC MF's the second highest. The lowest was 19.67%. The gold ETF page ranks all of them.

Against the gold price

The yardstick here is the international price converted to rupees each day, the series on our gold and silver price page. It carries no import duty, while the ETFs follow the domestic price, which does. So it is a common ruler, not the price these funds are meant to match.

The ETFs look five points ahead over one year and two points a year behind over three. Neither is their doing. Mostly, two jumps in the domestic price did it. In the week of the July 2024 Budget, which cut the import duty on gold, all four fell between about 5% and 8% against the international price. On 13 May 2026 all four rose about 5.2% against it in a single day. The three-year window holds both jumps; the one- and two-year windows hold only the second.

What the funds control shows in the gaps between them: 0.87 points over one year, 0.21 a year over two and 0.45 a year over three.

What stands out

Cost did not set the order. UTI charges the most, 0.59%, and returned the most over one, three and five years. ICICI Prudential, the second cheapest at 0.49%, was last of the four over one and three years. A 0.14-point gap in fees is smaller than the noise between four NAVs. On ₹10 lakh, the one-year gap between UTI and ICICI Prudential comes to about ₹8,700.

Single days move the numbers. All four peaked on 29 January 2026 and bottomed on 23 March. LIC MF's ETF fell 20.22% between those dates and Quantum's 22.34%, two points apart on the same metal over the same eight weeks. Over the full year they ended 0.27 points apart. The LIC MF vs Quantum page shows how closely the two lines run otherwise.

Size is lopsided. ICICI Prudential's ETF holds ₹27,185 crore, eight times UTI's, 19 times LIC MF's and 36 times Quantum's. We have no exchange volumes here, but an ETF buyer pays the market price, not the NAV, and the gap between the two is the cost this table cannot show.

The site's tracking-error figure needs care. The fund pages put these ETFs' tracking error between 3.15% (LIC MF) and 4.25% (Quantum). It is measured on monthly returns against the traded price of Nippon India ETF Gold BeES, the site's gold benchmark, so it carries that ETF's own market moves. Read it as a rough ranking, not as each fund's slippage from gold.

The people, and the no-demat route

A gold ETF leaves its managers little to decide. The summary documents name Sharwan Kumar Goyal and two colleagues at UTI, Chirag Mehta at Quantum and Sumit Bhatnagar with a colleague at LIC MF; ICICI Prudential's offer document names Gaurav Chikane among four.

Without a demat account, each house runs a fund of funds that buys its own ETF: UTI Gold ETF FoF, Quantum Gold ETF FOF, ICICI Prudential Gold ETF FOF and LIC MF Gold ETF FoF. Their Direct plans add 0.07%, 0.06%, 0.18% and 0.35% a year on top of the ETF's own cost. Our October look at gold funds of funds compares them, and SGBs vs gold ETFs vs physical gold covers the tax.

What this does not tell you

NAV is not your price. You buy and sell an ETF on the exchange, at a price that can sit above or below NAV, plus brokerage.

A year's order is fragile. Gaps under a point between four funds holding the same metal can reverse with one day's pricing.

Gold itself is the bigger risk. Each of these fell more than 20% between January and March 2026.

None of this is a recommendation. The other head-to-heads are UTI vs Quantum, UTI vs ICICI Prudential, UTI vs LIC MF, Quantum vs ICICI Prudential and ICICI Prudential vs LIC MF. The guide to gold funds and ETFs explains the products, and the SGB vs gold ETF calculator runs the costs for your own amount.