How Much Do Junkyards Pay for Cars in 2026?

How much junkyards pay for cars in 2026 comes down to weight: about $140–$200 per ton for a complete car, with a national average near $184 in iScrap’s crowd-sourced data (October 2026). At $140 to $200 a ton, a typical 3,000 to 4,000 lb car works out to roughly $210–$400.

The yard you pick moves the number most. iScrap users reported $250 a ton at a South Dakota yard this summer and $150 at a Georgia one. On a 4,000 lb car that gap is $200, and it is the one number you do control by calling around.

Typical junkyard payout by vehicle type

The math is curb weight in pounds, divided by 2,000, times the yard’s rate. The table uses 2025 curb weights from spec pages as examples, and three rates: a low $140, iScrap’s $183.63 and a high $200. The examples are mostly base trims. AWD, hybrid and crew-cab versions add roughly 100 to 500 lb, and older junk cars can weigh more or less than these.

Those are our calculations, not published payouts. They land close to Pull-A-Part’s own answer to how much it pays for cars, $250–$500 depending on weight: at iScrap’s rate, a 3,000 to 5,500 lb car comes to about $275–$505.

How much do junkyards pay for running cars versus cars that don’t run?

At a yard that buys by weight, about the same. The scale doesn’t know whether the engine turns over. Pick Your Part says it may deduct for whatever keeps a car from running, and Pull-A-Part’s intake asks about damage, so a dead car can come in a little under the math. A running car is where online and private buyers earn their keep, because they price resale and parts, not steel. More on that in selling a non-running car.

How much will a junkyard pay for my car? Do the math

Find your exact curb weight in our car weight guide, divide by 2,000, and multiply by a yard’s rate. A 3,350 lb midsize sedan is 1.675 tons, so a yard paying $160 a ton pays $268. If you would rather skip the arithmetic, the junk car value calculator does it. Expect the real number to differ from the math, because yards weigh the car as delivered and can deduct for missing parts.

How much junkyards pay for cars per ton in 2026

Whatever the sign says (junk yard, junkyard, scrap yard, salvage yard), a yard that pays by the ton is buying your car as steel. Do salvage yards buy cars? They do, so ask any yard whether its quote is per ton or a flat price. The price is the car’s weight times its per-ton rate. iScrap showed $183.63 per ton for a complete car when we checked on October 23, 2026. That number is a rolling blend of user reports, and the newest report behind it is from October 22, so treat it as a center point, not a quote.

Most yards land between $140 and $200. ScrapMonster lists $140 at an Eau Claire, Wisconsin yard on September 29. For scale, iScrap showed $164.12 on October 18, 2025, when single-yard reports ran from $105 to $205. That makes the headline about 12% higher on the year, but it is a noisy blend, so don’t read a trend into it.

Secondary trackers land nearby: clunqr put its national average at $175 in June 2026 and Reap My Ride said $190 in February. Prices drift (iScrap’s headline moves as new yard reports come in), but the gap between two yards in the same month is bigger than the drift.

Recent yard reports and posted rates

Recent single-yard reports ran from $140 in Wisconsin to $250 in South Dakota and New York; see the scrap car prices page for every report.

Posted yard boards tell the same story. Chuckran Auto Parts in Bridgewater, Massachusetts listed complete autos at $190 per net ton and incomplete autos at $160, effective September 28, 2026, and pays $5 per battery.

Net ton or gross ton: read the yard’s sign

A net ton is 2,000 pounds. A gross ton is 2,240. Chuckran posts both for the same car: $190 net and $212 gross. A 3,000 pound car comes to 1.5 net tons, or $285, and 1.34 gross tons, or $284. Same money. The trap is comparing one yard’s gross-ton price with another’s net-ton price. Divide a gross-ton price by 1.12 to compare like with like.

What junkyards deduct or refuse to pay for

The per-ton rate is for a complete car. iScrap defines that as engine, transmission, catalytic converter, battery, radiator, rims and tires, and wiring harness. Pull-A-Part’s intake questions ask whether the car is missing the engine, transmission, catalytic converter or wheels, and whether it has fire, flood or accident damage. Missing parts can drop you to a lower “incomplete” rate. Neither iScrap nor Pull-A-Part says by how much, but Chuckran’s board shows one yard’s gap: $160 per net ton for an incomplete car against $190 for a complete one, about 16% less, on top of the lost weight. If the transmission is still in the car but dead, sell a car with a bad transmission compares yards with the online buyers that take it as-is.

The catalytic converter causes the most trouble. iScrap warns that selling it separately could reclassify your car as incomplete. A June 22, 2026 BBB complaint says a $470 CarBrain offer on a 2004 VW Passat dropped to $250 at pickup because the converter was missing, and CarBrain’s reply says the details submitted did not accurately reflect the car.

A loose converter may also be worth less than you have heard. One New Jersey buyer’s price list (RRCats, October 23, 2026) shows an average of $90.15 per converter, with large foreign units listed at $90–$450. Many states, including California and Texas, require proof of ownership to sell one. Our catalytic converter price guide has the details.

Some yards list other deductions on their own pages. Pick Your Part says there may be deductions for accident damage and for whatever keeps a car from running. Towing varies too. Pull-A-Part offers free removal, while Pick Your Part says it arranges towing without saying it is free. Ask.

Junkyards vs online buyers vs scrap shredders

The word junkyard covers different kinds of buyers, and each sets its price differently.

Junkyards that buy cars, and how each one prices

A scrap yard weighs the car and pays its rate. Pick-and-pull chains such as Pull-A-Part and Pick Your Part run their own quote pages, and Pull-A-Part says its range depends on weight. Online buyers price differently. CarBrain says its offers come from CarBrain or its network of service providers and reflect location, damage, demand for the car and its parts, make, model, mileage and age. Peddle says a local towing partner handles the pickup.

Other national buyers publish their own terms. Wheelzy says it buys cars from model year 1981 or newer, even with missing parts as long as the engine and transmission are there, with free towing and check or cash when the driver arrives. Junk Car Medics says the typical payout is $300 to $1,500, a company claim we could not verify, and that it can adjust the price if the car differs significantly from what you reported. Our junk car buyers page lines them up side by side.

How do junkyards make money on your car?

A yard pays you for steel and then earns twice. Peddle says the cars it buys end up as used parts, as scrap through recyclers, or reconditioned for resale, and yards work the same way: sell what can be pulled, then send the hulk to a shredder. The USGS counts more than 280 car shredders in North America, which recycle more than 13 million tons of steel a year from cars.

Then there is the shredder. RMDAS, via Recycling Today, put shredded scrap at $418–$422 per ton from August 20 to September 19, 2026, more than double the yard rate. That is what mills pay for prepared metal. A yard buys an unprocessed car and has to cover fluid removal, hauling and shredding before the steel reaches a mill, so don’t expect the mill number.

Yard or online buyer: who pays more?

For a car worth only its weight, the highest per-ton rate near you wins. For a car with parts demand, or one that still runs, online and private buyers can beat any per-ton rate.

Quotes for the same kind of car spread wide. In CarBrain’s low-star Trustpilot reviews, one seller says CarBrain offered $85 for a working car while another buyer offered $600, and another says a Ford E350 van drew offers of $600–$800 and then sold for $7,000 on Facebook Marketplace. Those are self-reported. As of October 23, 2026, overall Trustpilot scores are still high: Peddle 4.7 from 213,198 reviews, CarBrain 4.8 from 7,834 (1-star reviews were 4% and 2% in September). The low-star complaints cluster around pickup-day price cuts and late tow drivers. For a buyer-by-buyer comparison, see cash for junk cars.

How much does the government pay for a junk car?

In California, the state pays $1,350, $1,500 or $2,000 to retire a car. It is the California vehicle retirement program, part of the Bureau of Automotive Repair’s Consumer Assistance Program (CAP), and the amount depends on your Smog Check result and your income:

Here is the catch for a junk car: it has to be currently registered, titled in your name, and driven under its own power to a BAR-contracted dismantler. The dismantler checks that it starts normally (no jump pack or starting fluid), moves forward at least 10 yards, and still has its doors, hood, dashboard, windshield, driver’s seat, a bumper, exhaust and working lights. A car that does not run or is missing major parts does not qualify, so for a dead car the junkyard or an online offer is the realistic route.

Expired tags only work if they expired recently. BAR requires a valid sticker, or all fees paid with the sticker expired no more than 120 days, and no lapse of more than 120 days during the two years before the current sticker’s expiration. For the $1,500 option only, a car not registered out of state in the last two years can instead show it was driven mainly in California with two years of California insurance (no gap over 120 days) or repair invoices from each of two calendar years. Business-registered cars don’t qualify, and neither does a sole owner who retired another car in the past 12 months.

Order matters. Apply first, online or by calling (866) 272-9642 for a paper form, and wait for the letter of eligibility. Do not retire the car before you have it, because BAR won’t pay for an early retirement. Then pick a contractor from BAR’s Find a dismantler list and go before the letter expires (miss it and you reapply). Bring the original letter, the title in your name and photo ID matching the letter. A stand-in also needs a DMV power of attorney (REG 260) and a copy of your ID. The dismantler pays by check. If the car qualifies, CAP usually wins by a mile: a complete 3,000 pound car is worth about $275 at iScrap’s October 23, 2026 average of $183.63 a ton, against $1,350 to $2,000 from CAP. Payments depend on available funds each fiscal year (July 1 to June 30). Some regions also run their own programs, such as South Coast AQMD’s Old-Vehicle Scrapping Program in greater Los Angeles and the Old Car Buy Back and Scrap Program in the Bay Area and other counties. Check their current terms before you count on one.

Complete, newer vehicles are where the gap is widest. One seller of a complete 2013 Chrysler Town & Country was offered $400 to $500 by local salvage yards and $1,075 (later $1,265) by an online buyer. At the other end, a 2010 Kia Soul that drew $305 online would likely have brought about $100 at a yard. Yards pay by weight, so they win on heavy, complete, older cars and lose when a newer car has one big failure and still has parts and rebuild value.

How to get more money from a junkyard

1. Keep the car complete. Leave the converter, battery, wheels and tires on. A loose battery is worth about $6–$15 (30–75 lb at $0.20 a lb, per iScrap), and it is on the complete-car list anyway.
2. Call three yards. Ask for today’s per-ton rate on a complete car, whether towing is free, and how they pay.
3. Check the date on any price. iScrap’s headline moves each time a new yard report arrives, and ScrapMonster updates bi-weekly, so last month’s quote may be stale.
4. Describe the car exactly: mileage, whether it runs, what is missing. Peddle and CarBrain both point to a mismatch with your description when they revise a quote at pickup.
5. Collect one online offer as a benchmark. Peddle and CarBrain offers are free.
6. If the car runs, price it privately before you scrap it. Never refund an “overpayment” on a check. The FTC lists that as a fake-check scam, and a check can turn out fake weeks after it clears, leaving you owing the bank.

Cash, checks and titles: what junkyards ask for

Payment is set yard by yard. Pull-A-Part says it brings cash to your car at pickup. Pick Your Part says it pays on the spot. Peddle’s default is a company check handed over at pickup, and it says cash is not guaranteed. Junk Car Medics says cash or a certified check, depending on location. Ask before you schedule the tow.

Titles are the other gate. iScrap says most states require one, though some yards accept a registration or insurance proof, so call ahead. CarBrain says it requires a title in the seller’s name. Peddle calls the signed title its primary document and says to contact it in advance if yours is missing, since alternatives may exist. Texas lets a recycler dismantle a car without a title only if it is at least 13 years old and has been unregistered for at least seven years (rule effective January 1, 2026). Our guide to a junk car without a title covers your options, and your state DMV has the final word. After the sale, file your state’s release of liability or notice of sale if it has one.

Scrap it or sell it whole?

Work out the scrap number from the table above. Then get one offer for the car as a whole. Rule of thumb: if the offer lands within about $50 of your scrap math, the car is worth its weight and a yard is fine. If it comes in far above, the buyer wants the car or its parts, so take the higher money.

A review on Automoblog (May 2024) lists an $890 Peddle offer for a 2004 Toyota Corolla that would not start, about three times the top of the compact-car row above. A DollarBreak post (September 2024) reports a $385 Peddle offer for a 2004 Buick LeSabre with 188,000 miles and no catalytic converter. Both are single anecdotes from before this year, not a payout range. To part it out yourself, see selling a car for parts.

What to do next

Work out your scrap number from the table, then call three local yards and ask for the rate, whether it is per net or gross ton, and whether towing is free. Next, request offers from Peddle and CarBrain. Both are free, both include towing, and you can decline. Take the highest number that comes with free towing and payment at pickup.

More options are on our cash for junk cars page and in the junk car buyers comparison. For the paperwork order, see how to junk a car, and for pickup options, junk car removal.

Written and fact-checked by the Junk Car Worth team. Prices and buyer policies checked October 2026. How we estimate value.