Gold Magnet

Gold Magnet is a plant that is the upgraded form of the Magnet-shroom which costs $3,000 to buy the seed packet from Crazy Dave's Twiddydinkies, and costs 50 sun to plant. Every five seconds, it collects up to five pieces of money on-screen, saving the player's time and allowing him/her to focus on attacking. It can attract both coins and diamonds, which is helpful for making money quickly.

Suburban Almanac entry
Gold Magnet

Gold Magnets collect coins and diamonds for you.

Must be planted on magnet-shrooms

"How did I end up here?" asks Gold Magnet. "I was on the fast track - corner office, full benefits, stock options. I was gonna be Vice President of Midwestern Operations. Now I'm here, on this lawn, in serious danger of being eaten to death. Ooh! A coin!"

Cost: 50

Recharge: very slow

Usage
The Gold Magnet costs 50 sun to plant, and must be planted on an existing Magnet-shroom (A Magnet-shroom costs 100 sun). The Magnet-shroom does not have to be awake, as the Gold Magnet is not a mushroom. Every 15 seconds, when there are Coins or diamonds on the field, it charges, collecting all coins/diamonds on all the field.

On iOS or DS versions, the Gold Magnet should rarely be used, as it is not as time consuming and difficult to touch all the coins in sight as it is to click them with a mouse.

Note: Gold Magnets do not have ferro-magnetism, meaning that they cannot collect any other metal objects other than money. They do not behave like Magnet-shrooms at all, not taking away buckets, pogo sticks, Ladders, etc. from zombies. These are only necessary if large volumes of money are being dropped, as they are otherwise useless.

Strategies
Due to their automatic money collection tendencies, Gold Magnets are very popular to use with Marigold, since the latter reliably generates money every 24 seconds. It is not wise to plant a Coffee Bean on a Magnet-shroom before upgrading it, as the Gold Magnet is not a mushroom and does not sleep in the daytime. There are existing gold-farming strategies that exploit several Marigolds producing money while the enemy fruitlessly hammers away at the impenetrable outer walls, especially in Last Stand.

When you are Gold Farming, it is recommended to use them to collect the large amount of coins that Marigolds give you.

Trivia

 * Blover and Gold Magnet are the only two plants with a three-beat cycle, making three bounces while going from one side to the other.
 * The Gold Magnet is one of the three upgrade plants that lose abilities from their downgrades (not being able to grab metal objects from zombies), the others being Cattail (losing the ability for a land plant other than Pumpkin to be planted on it) and Cob Cannon (not firing on its own and not being able to plant a Pumpkin on it).
 * Although the Magnet-shroom is a mushroom, and needs a Coffee Bean to function during the day, the Gold Magnet is diurnal, and, even without being woken before upgrading, can function anytime. The Gold Magnet also has a stem and leaves, unlike the Magnet-shroom and other mushrooms. Because of these, it is assumed that the Gold Magnet is not a mushroom.
 * Gold Magnets use magnetism to pick up gold coins, silver coins, and diamonds despite the fact that silver and gold are non-magnetic, and diamonds aren't even metals.
 * Because Gold Magnets cannot pick up coins or diamonds until they touch the ground, they will still try to pick them up; but the coins will not move, and will remain there.
 * This and Winter Melon are the only two upgrade plants that cost less sun than their original plant.
 * When a Magnet-shroom glows it becomes bright blue, but if a Gold Magnet glows it's bright yellow.
 * The Gold Magnet is the cheapest upgrade plant in the game, costing only 50 sun, the same cost as a Sunflower, maybe because of its little use in battle.
 * This, the Sun-shroom, the Sunflower, Twin Sunflower, Flower Pot, Lily Pad, Plantern, Marigold and Coffee Bean are the only plants that do not have either offensive or defensive capabilities.
 * This, Chomper, Spikerock and Grave Buster are the only plants that have a name that does not involve any plants.
 * The Gold Magnet may attempt to collect coins after all the coins on-screen have been cleared by clicking. It will glow, but not attract any coins.
 * On the iPad version's seed packet, it is missing its eyebrows.
 * The Gold Magnet and the Fume-shroom are the only two plants whose Almanac Entry states they held a job (Gold Magnet had a corner office and was on the fast track to becoming a high-level executive for a company) before the game.
 * Gold Magnets take a second to magnetize coins and diamonds while the Magnet-shroom instantly grabs metallic objects. The reason for this is because it has to rear back before magnetizing.
 * When the Gold Magnet attracts coins, it scrunches up its eyebrows as if it is concentrating.
 * The Gold Magnet appears as if it has no eyebrows on its seed packet.
 * In DS and DSi versions, all money the Gold Magnet attracts moves at a slower rate than any other version of the game.
 * If the player has more than one Gold Magnet on the lawn, they will only work one at a time, and never two at once.
 * The Magnet-shroom is a mushroom, and the Gold Magnet is a plant, which is pretty strange since it is an upgrade to it.
 * Unlike the Magnet-shroom, the Gold Magnet does not have to dispose the attracted object.
 * Stinky the Snail in the Zen Garden is like a Gold Magnet for the Zen Garden. Plus, they cost the same ($3000) in Crazy Dave's Twiddydinkies.
 * If one looks closely, when Gold Magnet attracts coins or diamonds, it has no eyebrows.
 * The Gold Magnet is the cheapest plant in Crazy Dave's Twiddydinkies.
 * If a Gold Magnet gets ready to magnet up a coin and the player picks that coin before it does, it will still show the attracting coins animation, but it will not attract anything (except for other coins on-screen).
 * The Gold Magnet and the Spikerock are the only upgrade plants that are a different type than their downgrades. The Magnet-shroom is a mushroom while the Gold Magnet is not, and the Spikeweed is a plant while the Spikerock is a rock.
 * The Gold Magnet collects diamonds first, then gold coins and finally silver ones.
 * In Plants vs. Zombies: All Stars, it has no eyebrows and its leaves are straight.