First lets start with 2x2 cardboard flips. Did you know there are different quality 2x2 cardboard holders? The first time I placed an order I thought they were all the same. I placed a large order online for 100 of each size. I mean after all they were cheap and I thought I need them anyway so let me buy a bunch. Well when I got them in hand they felt cheap, not your normal cheap but really garbage like cheap. Thin cardboard stock, baggy mylar window and the overall feel felt like a 6 year old put it together. I have since bought better ones to replace the crappy ones I got in my first order.
Pros: Easy to use, easy to label, inexpensive, easy to store in boxes or pages
Cons: May not offer enough protection for those that like to constantly touch their coins, requires cleaning off loose chipboard before using.
And on a side note the ones that are self adhesive may not be that great of an idea. Over time the adhesive will get weaker and the holder will open up.
SaFlips are also easy to use, you load the coin in one side and the other side holds a label. The polyester is clear allowing to view the coin and if needed the edge. But these holders are lightweight, even lighter than the cardboard 2x2's. If you drop a coin by accident expect the coin to be damaged, these holders offer less protection than a 2x2 cardboard holder. Also if you do decide to use a label you won't be able to see the reverse of the coin when folded over. On a side note I have noticed that coins stored for a long time in SaFlips leaves a ring mark in the holder.
Pros: Easy to use, easy to label, inexpensive, easy to store in boxes
Cons: These holders attract dust like crazy, non-viewable reverse of coin when labeled, offers virtually no protection if dropped, these holders don't fit properly into pages
AirTite holders are great as they offer lots of protection. The plastic used are strong acrylic, are archival safe and they are often direct fit. The problem with AirTite holders are that they are bulky, these holders take up lots of space and are not easy to store. They are round and will not fit in regular pages forcing you to spend lots of money on special pages. These pages holds only a maximum of 9 coins for small coins and 4 for larger coins. They are also quite expensive, there are also square AirTite holders but expect these to be even more bulkier, pages for the square ones are a little better as they hold more. But the caveat is that not one company has declared their pages to be PVC free or archival safe which leads me to believe that storing square AirTite holders in pages is dangerous for your coins.
Pros: Offers good protection
Cons: Not expensive but not cheap either expect to pay around a dollar each, hard to store and bulky, expensive pages and albums for the round holders, not one company has declared their pages to be PVC free or archival safe.
Last but not least there are the CoinEdge holders. I was skeptical about using these as I had not heard much about them. I researched and googled online but still had limited information and reviews. From the few reviews I heard some collectors state that the holders are quite good but were flimsy. Nevertheless I wanted to try them, but to be honest I got these because none of the other holders were doing it for me. I hesitantly ordered these holders hoping for the best, then I noticed that they offered pages to hold the CoinEdge holders. I decided to order these too to try them out. Well what did I think? the holders are decent but the pages are horrible. Where do I begin? flimsy plastic covered in fake velvet, when I got them pieces of velvet were flaking off and they attracted dust like crazy. The holders are decent at best, it is two pieces of plastic, one front and one back. You load the coin in the front piece and snap the back piece together. They claim that the plastic only touches the edge of the coins which is fine, but upon closer inspection I noticed that many of the coins loaded in were shoved up against the front of the holder. Oftentimes the front holder started looking like they were getting damaged. My first thought was this is not good so I pulled the back piece off to see what was going on. Lo and behold guess what? the coins were firmly stuck in the holder, this leads me to believe that the coins were getting squished in the holder and over time might be damaged from the constant pressure.
Pros: Offers decent protection, makes the coins really shiny more so than they really are
Cons: Coins getting squished in-between two pieces of plastic is not my thing, coins stuck in holder forces you to dig them out with fingers which may lead to scratches or fingerprints, the plastic pieces are flimsy
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