Centering
How evenly is the card cut? We measure the borders on the front and back. A well-centred card looks more premium and achieves higher grades.
Subgrades: Centering, Corners, Edges & Surface
Every graded card is rated in four subgrades – centering, corners, edges and surface. Together they form the overall grade from 1 to 10. Here you'll learn what's behind each criterion and how the exclusive Gold Label is awarded.
The 4 criteria
What do the subgrades mean?
Corners
Are the corners sharp and clean? Whitening, dents or chipped corners lower the grade – a common issue on heavily played cards.
Edges
Edges are checked for wear, tears and colour chipping. On holos and Alt Arts they are especially sensitive.
Surface
Scratches, print lines, dents, clouding or fingerprints all factor in here – often the decisive criterion on modern foils.
Gold Label & half grades
If a card scores 10 in all four subgrades, we award the exclusive Gold Label – the crown jewel of any collection. In addition, we work with half grades in the upper range (9.5, 8.5, 7.5 and 6.5; below that we award whole grades) to capture the condition even more precisely. This makes it transparently clear why your card received exactly that grade.
How the overall grade is composed in detail is explained on our grading scale. The full inspection workflow is shown on the grading process page.
How to judge your card in advance
With some practice you can roughly estimate the likely grade of your card yourself – which helps you decide whether sending it in is worth it. Start with the centering: hold a ruler against it or compare the border widths visually. Even a ratio of around 60/40 is often borderline for top grades. Ideally view the corners under a loupe – fine whitening that's barely visible to the naked eye shows clearly there.
For the surface, move the card slowly under a point light source: scratches, print lines and – on foils – clouding become visible. Check the edges for wear and small tears. Remember that the surface counts most because it is weighted double. A dinged corner does not automatically cost the 10: with 10 on surface, edges and centering and a 9 on corners the formula gives 9.80 - still Gem Mint 10 (the Gold Label requires four 10s). How the final grade is formed from the four subgrades is explained in detail on the grading scale.
Next: Grading scale · Process · Order · Pop Report · FAQ
Transparent rating across 4 subgrades
Traceable, fair and detailed – that's how PGS rates your cards.