What the Grading Numbers Actually Mean

Hand two people the same year and mint mark and the prices can sit twenty dollars apart or two thousand. Grade explains nearly all of that.

Seventy points sounds like a lot to learn. You do not need the points. You need to know where the scale bends.

The map

One through fifty-eight covers coins that were used as money, with wear increasing as the number falls. Sixty through seventy covers coins that were never spent at all, which the trade calls mint state.

Between fifty-eight and sixty there is no wear left to remove, so what separates those coins is whether they ever entered circulation. Prices tend to jump there rather than climb.

4 to 8, Good and Very Good: heavy wear, design still legible
12 to 35, Fine through Very Fine: moderate wear, most detail intact
40 to 58, Extremely Fine through About Uncirculated: wear on the high points only
60 to 70, Mint State: never circulated, ranked on marks, strike and luster

Where the cliffs are

Price does not rise smoothly with grade. It sits flat, then leaps. A common Morgan dollar might move a modest amount between MS-62 and MS-64 and then several multiples going into MS-65, because the number of surviving coins thins out sharply while the number of collectors chasing them does not.

Every one of those cliffs is a reason to look at coins one at a time. Round a whole collection down by a single grade and the arithmetic looks reasonable while the total quietly loses a third of itself.

The three things graders weigh besides wear

Luster is the cartwheel of light across an original surface. It is a byproduct of how the metal flowed under the die and it cannot be restored, faked or polished back. Its absence is the first thing anyone experienced looks for.

Strike is how completely the design transferred, which varies by mint and by year and has nothing to do with how the coin was treated afterward. Eye appeal is the last piece and it is unapologetically subjective: even toning and clean fields sell for more than blotchy ones at the identical technical grade.

When the fee is worth paying

Certification costs money and takes weeks, so it only makes sense when the grade is worth guaranteeing. Two situations qualify: a coin valuable enough that a locked-in grade adds more than the submission cost, and a coin scarce enough that buyers want third-party authentication before they will bid seriously.

On circulated 90% silver it is a waste of postage. What you want from a buyer is to be told which of your coins sit on which side of that line, out loud, rather than having a submittable coin quietly bought as raw material.

Key takeaways

One to fifty-eight circulated; sixty and up never did.
Prices leap at certain grades instead of climbing evenly.
Luster is unrepairable, which is why cleaning is so costly.
Strike and eye appeal move prices at identical technical grades.
Certification pays on valuable or scarce coins and nothing else.

FAQ

Common questions

What is MS-65 in plain terms?

A coin that never circulated, still carrying full luster, with only light scattered marks. It sits at a price threshold in most series, which is why the grade gets quoted so often.

Can I learn to grade my own?

The worn end of the scale, yes, reasonably quickly. Telling MS-63 from MS-65 reliably takes years and a lot of coins in hand, which is precisely the gap certification exists to fill.

What happens if a coin has been cleaned?

The service returns it in a holder marked as cleaned rather than giving it a straight numeric grade, and the market discounts it heavily from that point on.

Request a quote

Finished reading? Get the number.

Describe it briefly whenever you are ready and a buyer comes back with a figure.