The pre-decimal twopence was a coin worth 1/120 of a pound sterling, or two pence. It was a short-lived denomination in copper, being minted in only 1797 by Matthew Boulton's Soho Mint.

These coins were made legal tender for amounts of up to one shilling by a proclamation of 26 July 1797. Short-lived twopence coins in silver were also minted in 1817, 1818 and 1820. Twopence coins were made redundant in 1860 with the advent of bronze coinage.

The minting of silver pennies for general circulation was halted by the British government in 1660, because the cost of silver had risen too high. By the late 18th century this policy had caused a deficiency in the number of circulating pennies, and many merchants and mining companies had taken to issuing their own copper tokens. For example, the Parys Mining Company on Anglesey issued huge numbers of tokens (although their acceptability was limited).

In 1797 to alleviate this coin shortage, the government authorised Matthew Boulton to strike copper pennies and twopences at his Soho Mint in Birmingham. As it was a requirement that a coin's face value should correspond to the value of the base metal, each was made from two pence worth of copper (2 ounces), making the coins significantly larger than earlier pennies which had been struck in silver. Their large size, combined with the thick rim, led to the nickname "cartwheels". All "cartwheel" twopences are marked with the date 1797. In total, around 720,000 such coins were minted.

A short-lived twopence denomination in silver was also produced, with circulation issues in 1817, 1818 and 1820, after which silver twopence coins were issued only as Maundy money.