Here, we can see just a few of the natural and artificial materials often associated with blue sapphire. The values are only estimates, but you can see a stark difference between the amount buyers pay for an authenticated natural sapphire versus its many other lookalikes in the trade.
Some people say that you can identify sapphire by looking if a stone possesses inclusions of a certain "appearance". Man-made flux synthetic sapphires can fool these individuals with veil-like or wispy fingerprint inclusions, which are a common observations. Likewise, cheaper blue gemstones like kyanite and iolite can showcase a wide variety of natural-looking inclusions, because they themselves were dug up from the earth as well.
Gemological testing is necessary to determine what exactly your stone's identity is, so that you can properly value it. Eyesight alone can help you grade for color intensity, and maybe even overall quality- but it cannot authenticate a natural gemstone variety or species on its own. At best, eyesight based identification (without loupes or microscopes) are simply experienced-based guessing, which has proven to be very mistake-prone for many of our friends in the gemstone and jewelry trade.
Tests that check for refractive index, internal growth patterns, optic character, and absorption spectra are much more reliable and safe for you to gain assurance on the worth and indentity of your precious possessions.
