sentimental value
Definition
The emotional or personal significance attached to an object, memento, or experience, often outweighing its practical, monetary, or utilitarian worth.
A non-financial worth derived from memories, associations, or nostalgia linked to an item.
Examples
She wouldn't part with her faded concert ticket stubs, despite their zero resale value—their sentimental value from that wild night in '98 was unbeatable.
He polished his grandpa's rusty pocket knife daily, ignoring its market worth of pennies for the sentimental value of tales from the old man's fishing trips.
The mismatched china plate survived a dozen moves purely on sentimental value, a souvenir from a family picnic where everyone got food poisoning but laughed it off.
My drawer overflows with obsolete gadgets like that flip phone, hoarded not for tech specs but for the sentimental value of texting crushes in emoji-less glory.