Silver has had an extraordinary three years. Investors who bought a silver exchange-traded fund (ETF) in August 2023 saw their money compounding at over 44% a year.
That is the kind of return equity investors chase and rarely find, delivered by a metal that most Indian households traditionally bought as jewellery or coins.
The reason is a structural shift in what silver actually is. For most of history it was gold’s cheaper cousin, a precious metal bought for the same reasons.
Today, over half of annual silver demand comes from industry, and that share is growing. Solar panels, electric vehicles, semiconductors and increasingly, AI infrastructure all need silver, because it is the most electrically conductive element on earth.
Meanwhile supply cannot respond. Roughly three-quarters of the world’s silver is extracted as a by-product of copper, lead, and zinc mining, which means a higher silver price does not summon more of it. The result has been six consecutive years of global supply deficit.
That combination, price-insensitive industrial demand meeting structurally constrained supply, is what produced the returns.
Keeping that in mind, let’s look at the top 5 silver ETFs in India.
A word on how we have defined ‘top’ here. These five are ranked by their 3-year returns, as of 5 August 2026.
India has 18 listed silver ETFs, but only 9 have a 3-year track record. The rest launched during the rally, which tells you something about how fund houses respond to a hot theme.
Top 5 Silver ETFs by Three-Year Returns
| Rank | Silver ETF | 3-Yr Return (CAGR) | NAV (Rs) | Tracking Error |
| 1 | ICICI Pru Silver ETF | 44.42% | 222.09 | 11.94 |
| 2 | Mirae Asset Silver ETF | 44.39% | 216.61 | 11.74 |
| 3 | HDFC Silver ETF | 44.31% | 212.87 | 11.86 |
| 4 | Kotak Silver ETF | 44.30% | 21.58 | 11.91 |
| 5 | DSP Silver ETF | 44.26% | 214.43 | 11.76 |
Data Source: Ace MF, as of 5 Aug 2026
Look at the returns column closely. The gap between the best performer and the fifth is 0.17 percentage points. Across all 9 ETFs with a 3-year record, from ICICI Prudential at 44.42% down to UTI at 43.41%, the entire spread is just over one percentage point.
Why These Funds Are Almost Identical
A silver ETF does one thing: It holds physical silver and tracks its price. There is no fund manager picking stocks, no strategy, no research edge. Every one of these funds owns essentially the same asset, so their returns must be nearly the same.
What separates them is friction. Three small things create the differences you see in the table.
The expense ratio, which is deducted daily from the fund’s value. The efficiency with which the fund manager buys, stores and manages physical silver. And the fund’s cash holdings, since a fund must keep some cash for redemptions, and cash does not rise with silver.
Add those up over three years and you get a 0.17 percentage point spread. That is the scale of the difference between the top five.
This brings us to the number most investors ignore.
Tracking Error: The Number That Actually Matters
Tracking error measures how closely a fund follows the thing it is supposed to track. A lower number means the ETF’s returns hug the silver price more tightly. A higher number means it drifts, sometimes above, sometimes below.
For a passively managed product, this is the real measure of quality. Here the differences are far larger than the return differences.
| Silver ETF | Tracking Error | 3-Yr Record? |
| Angel One Silver ETF | 9.81 | No |
| Mirae Asset Silver ETF | 11.74 | Yes |
| Aditya Birla SL Silver ETF | 11.75 | Yes |
| DSP Silver ETF | 11.76 | Yes |
| HDFC Silver ETF | 11.86 | Yes |
| ICICI Pru Silver ETF | 11.94 | Yes |
| Motilal Oswal Silver ETF | 18.17 | No |
| Bandhan Silver ETF | 18.96 | No |
The range across all 18 funds runs from 9.81 to 18.96, a far wider spread than the one percentage point separating their returns.
The established funds with three-year records cluster tightly between 11.7 and 12. The wider tracking errors belong largely to newer launches, which is what you would expect from funds still building scale and refining their operations.
Among the top five, Mirae Asset has the lowest tracking error at 11.74 and DSP is close behind at 11.76, while ICICI Prudential, despite topping the returns table, has the highest of the group at 11.94.
So the fund that looks best on returns is not the one that tracks silver most tightly. Over a longer holding period, that distinction may matter more than 0.17 percentage points of past return.
#1 ICICI Prudential Silver ETF
The top performer over three years at 44.42%, and one of the earliest silver ETFs in India, launched in early 2022.
ICICI Prudential Silver ETF brings the advantage of scale. Larger silver ETFs generally trade with better liquidity on the exchange, which means tighter bid-ask spreads when you buy or sell.
For an ETF, that trading cost is a real expense that never shows up in the expense ratio.
Do note that its tracking error of 11.94 is the highest among our top five, so its slight return advantage has come with marginally looser tracking.
#2 Mirae Asset Silver ETF
Second on returns Mirae Asset Silver ETF at 44.39%, and arguably the strongest all-round candidate of the five.
What lifts it is the tracking error of 11.74, the lowest of any silver ETF with a 3-year record, and second lowest across all 18 funds.
For a passive product, that is the metric that speaks to operational quality.
The difference between its return and ICICI Prudential’s is 0.03 percentage points, which is statistically meaningless. The difference in tracking error is more meaningful for a long-term investor.
#3 HDFC Silver ETF
Third HDFC Silver ETF at 44.31%, with a tracking error of 11.86, that sits in the middle of the established group.
HDFC brings one of the largest fund management platforms in India and the distribution reach that comes with it.
For investors already holding other HDFC funds, consolidation on a single platform has practical convenience value.
#4 Kotak Silver ETF
Fourth Kotak Silver ETF at 44.3%, and worth noting for a purely practical reason: Its NAV is around Rs 21.58 against roughly Rs 212 to Rs 222 for most peers. It reflects a different face value at launch, and the underlying silver exposure per rupee invested is the same.
But the lower unit price does allow smaller, more precise investment amounts, which matters for investors buying in modest tranches or running a systematic plan.
Its tracking error of 11.91 is broadly in line with the group.
#5 DSP Silver ETF
Fifth DSP Silver ETF at 44.26%, with a tracking error of 11.76, the second lowest among the top five.
The spread between DSP and the top-ranked fund is 0.17 percentage points over three years.
On an investment of Rs 1 lakh held for that period, the difference in outcome is small enough that liquidity, expense ratio and your own broking platform matter more than the ranking.
How to Actually Choose
Given how similar these funds are, 3 factors should drive the decision more than past returns.
Expense ratio, because it compounds.
Liquidity and trading volume, because an ETF is bought on the exchange, not from the fund house.
And the tracking error, because it tells you whether the fund reliably delivers what it promises.
Conclusion
The most useful conclusion from this data is not which silver ETF to buy. It’s that the question matters far less than most rankings imply.
All five of these funds hold the same metal and have delivered returns within 0.17 percentage points of each other over three years.
There is no manager skill to identify, no strategy to evaluate, no research edge to pay for. Choosing between them on past returns is close to meaningless.
What does differentiate them is operational: how tightly they track silver, what they charge, and how easily you can trade them.
Evaluate your own financial goals, time horizon, risk tolerance, and each fund’s costs and tracking record as key factors before drawing any investment conclusions.
Happy investing.
Disclaimer: This article is for information purposes only. It is not a stock recommendation and should not be treated as such. Learn more about our recommendation services here…
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