This question is obviously for people in the eurozone.
Based on my personal experience here in central Italy I mostly see Italian euro coins (obviously) but I get quite frequently German euro coins, followed by French and Spanish ones. How often do you get euro coins from other euro countries, and from which one the most?

32 comments

  1. All the time.

    I’m in Belgium so France, Netherlands and Germany are probably the most common but we get them from all over.

  2. I checked my walled and I had 7 (yellow) coins. And 5 were Spanish, 1 Netherlands and 1 French.

    So it seems right. We get coins from France or Portugal because they are close and from tourism (Germany, Netherlands, Nordic countries, etc).

  7. From most to least common I’d wager would be:

    German -] Spanish -] French -] Austrian -] Italian -] Dutch -] Belgian -] Greek

    These are the ones you can expect to find in your change commonly. The rest like Irish Portuguese Finnish etc also show up rarely, but its not outrageously uncommon. The really far away ones like Cyprus Malta and the Baltics are very rare, but do pop up. Euro Coins from the microstates like San Marino you can only find in coin shops.

    Personally I have found Euro Coins from all Euro Countries in my change with the exceptions of Malta, Cyprus, Estonia and the Micro States.

  8. I’ve just checked my pocket here in Ireland, I’ve 2 Irish 20c, a French 20c, a German €1 coin, a Spanish €2 and a natty €2 German coin celebrating 25 years since reunification. It’s actually a lovely coin.

  9. It’s been a long time (a few years at least) since I had actual paper money or coins so basically never.

  10. Very often, with Spain and France being the most common ones (there’s a lot of Portuguese immigrants in France)

  12. It’s mostly German coins a lot of the time. Which makes sense as Germany is such a cash-dependent country. Dutch, Belgian, French, Italian, Spanish and Austrian coins I also see quite often while others are much rarer.

  14. I use cash like once a year so I don’t have much of a sample size, but the 1 euro coin I have in my wallet is from Spain.

  16. I’m in the north-west of Spain and I just checked the coins around me and found 9 Spanish, 1 French and 1 German. I would say that the proportion of foreign coins is usually higher than this though.

  17. I live in Southern Germany and I just had a look in my wallet. There were 8 German coins, one Austrian and one French.

    I would have expected more foreign coins. It is not uncommon to get coins from the bigger and medium sized Euro countries. Getting them from smaller states like Malta, Cyprus or the Baltics is something special though.

  18. Greek, German and Spanish coins are the ones I get more often. None of these countries are the ones I see the most tourists from, where I am in Northern France, but I’m guessing it’s also a lot of French tourists going on holidays over there who bring back the coins.

    Oddly enough, I see a lot of Dutch tourists, but hardly ever any Dutch coins.

  21. Okay I was very bored, so I got out my wallet and my small-coins-ill-never-use jar and counted.

    It’s 68 coins, thereof:

    46 Austrian

    10 German

    5 French

    3 Italian

    2 Spanish

    1 Slovenian

    1 Belgian

    I’m surprised that there’s more from France then from Italy, but then again it’s a small sample size. Germany makes sense since there’s a ton of Germans in Vienna and I think they’re as cash loving as we are.

  22. Small sample, but still (Lithuanian here):

    * 21 Irish euro coins (I have never been to Ireland though)
    * 4 Lithuanian coins
    * 3 German ones
    * 2 French coins
    * 1 Latvian
    * 1 Portuguese
    * 1 Greek
    * 1 Italian.

  23. Inventory of Coins :

    Austria : 1

    Belgium : 3

    France : 2

    Germany : 2

    Spain : 1

    Netherlands : 1

    Euro Bills (first character of serial number)

    Slovenia : 1

    France : 2

    Germany : 1

    Living in Antwerpen.

  25. I always have Spanish, French and German coins. They’re the most common foreigners and you can find them easily. Probably 1/3 of those I come across are foreign

    I’m from Piedmont btw

  26. By instinct I’d say it’s quite common to get Spanish and German coins, and I think I often have Irish ones also. To check that I went to my wallet and here is what I get:

    – 11 French
    – 5 Spanish
    – 3 German
    – 2 Greek
    – 1 Italian
    – 1 Irish
    – 1 Portuguese

    I really rarely use cash so I’m quite surprised by this variety!

  27. I’ve got 6 Latvian coins right now in my wallet, 3 German, and 1 each from Lithuania, Spain, Ireland, and Estonia.

    When I do pay attention, there seems to be a surprising number of Spanish coins in circulation here.

  28. I collect the Irish coins cause I love the harp on the back. Other than that I see a bunch of different country coins but I never really know which country they’re from.

  30. I’ll make sure to tell you when I get my first non-Croatian euros in a year or two.

    I expect after the first summer most coins in Croatia will be foreign.

  31. There was a modern art exhibition in Jerusalem a while ago, with many alternative-history/reality exhibits. They were handing out Euro coins that didn’t really exists, such as:

    1. A UK Euro with Elizabeth II on the other side
    2. An Israeli Euro with ancient Hebrew inscriptions on the other side

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