India, Oct. 18 -- Gold IRAs allow people to save for retirement through physical gold. A gold IRA is a type of self-directed individual retirement account that lets investors hold physical gold as part of their retirement savings. It can also include other precious metals, such as silver, platinum and palladium.

Gold IRAs work differently from traditional retirement accounts. Instead of holding investments such as stocks or mutual funds, these accounts hold actual precious metals. However, they offer similar tax advantages to traditional and Roth individual retirement accounts (IRAs), according to USA TODAY.

Investors use gold to protect their retirement savings during uncertain times. Gold has historically been seen as a way to protect...