Key takeaways
- There are two separate systems in play: marketplace condition labels used by sellers, and numeric scales assigned by professional graders. They answer different questions and do not map cleanly onto each other.
- TCGplayer's published marketplace scale runs Near Mint, Lightly Played, Moderately Played, Heavily Played and Damaged, and it states that Mint and Gem Mint cards are not sold on the marketplace.
- CGC's published grading scale is a 10-point scale with half grades, topped by a Pristine 10 reserved for cards flawless under ten-times magnification; PSA publishes a scale running from Gem Mint 10 down to Poor 1.
- Certain manufacturing defects — crimping and significant miscuts — automatically make a card Damaged under TCGplayer's standards, regardless of how clean it otherwise is.
- Condition is a judgement made against published criteria, which is why our app records a condition note you write and never assigns one itself.
"Near Mint" and "9" are not two words for the same thing. They come from two different systems, built by different organisations, for different purposes, and there is no official conversion between them.
That is the single most useful fact in this whole subject, and it explains most of the arguments you will see about whether a card was described honestly. One system is a seller's promise on a marketplace. The other is an independent assessment by a grading company. Confusing them makes both look inconsistent.
System one: marketplace condition labels
These exist so a buyer knows what will arrive in the envelope. They are set by the marketplace, published for sellers, and applied by the seller to a raw card.
TCGplayer publishes such a set of standards, and its marketplace allows sellers to list cards in five conditions: Near Mint, Lightly Played, Moderately Played, Heavily Played and Damaged. Its published overview is explicit that Mint and Gem Mint cards are not sold on the marketplace at all — the scale simply does not have that rung.
The published descriptions, in brief:
- Near Mint. Minimal wear from shuffling, play or handling; can have a nearly unmarked surface, crisp corners and unblemished edges outside a few slight flaws. The band covers cards with no imperfections and cards with a few minimal ones.
- Lightly Played. May have minor edge wear, scuffs or scratches, with no significant imperfections and no issue with structural integrity.
- Moderately Played. Can have edge wear, surface wear, scratching or scuffing, bends with creases, or a combination of moderate examples of these. Some imperfections are acceptable provided they do not affect structural integrity.
- Heavily Played. Shows a major amount of wear, potentially with creasing, whitening and other faults, but must still be authenticatable and not structurally compromised.
- Damaged. Wear or imperfections beyond the standards for the other conditions — major border wear, bends, tears, splitting, foreign substances, or other damage affecting the integrity of the card.
TCGplayer frames conditioning around three properties of the card: its physical structure and cardstock stability, its playability as a game piece, and whether it can still be authenticated using the manufacturer's authentication markers. That framing is more useful than a wear checklist, because it tells you what the categories are for.
The rule that catches people out
Under those published standards, certain manufacturing defects — crimping, and significant miscuts or shifting — automatically make a card Damaged regardless of any other imperfection. So do alterations such as stamps, signatures, paint or marker.
A card can come straight out of a fresh pack, never touched by a sleeve, and be Damaged because of how the sheet was cut. TCGplayer also notes that, with rare exceptions, it does not take a product line's general quality control into account — frequent miscutting across a set does not typically exempt those cards.
Foil cards, incidentally, are evaluated by the same criteria as their non-foil counterparts under those standards, with the caveat that some imperfections are more noticeable on foil and that foils can be more prone to curling.
System two: grading company numeric scales
These exist so a card's condition can be assessed independently, recorded and sealed. They are set by the grading company, applied by its graders under controlled conditions, and attached permanently to the card in a holder.
CGC publishes a 10-point scale with half grades. Its top rung, Pristine 10, is reserved for cards that are flawless under ten-times magnification and is described as having 50/50 centring with flawless colour and registration. Below it sits Gem Mint 10 — a card that received a 10 overall but where one criterion did not meet the Pristine requirements — then Mint+ 9.5, Mint 9, NM/Mint+ 8.5, NM/Mint 8, Near Mint+ 7.5, Near Mint 7, and onward down through Ex/NM, Excellent, VG/Ex, Very Good, Good and below.
PSA publishes its own grading standards separately, describing a scale that runs from Gem Mint 10 down to Poor 1, applied after a card has been authenticated.
Notice two things. Both scales use words you have already seen — "Near Mint" appears in both systems at quite different places — and the two grading companies do not use identical rungs as each other either. CGC's half-grade structure and its Pristine/Gem Mint split at the top have no direct equivalent in a scale that tops out at a single 10.
Why the two systems do not translate
| Question | Marketplace label | Grader numeric scale |
|---|---|---|
| Who assigns it | The seller, against published standards | The grading company, under controlled conditions |
| What it covers | Overall wear, structure, playability, authenticability | Centring, corners, edges and surface assessed together |
| Where the top is | Near Mint; Mint and Gem Mint are not listed on TCGplayer's marketplace | Pristine 10 or Gem Mint 10, depending on the company |
| What it is for | Setting a buyer's expectation before a raw card ships | Recording and sealing an independent assessment |
| Is it reversible | Yes — relist at a different condition | No — the grade is encapsulated with the card |
Anyone who tells you that Near Mint "equals" a specific number is estimating, and the estimate is unreliable because the systems do not measure the same things. Centring, for instance, barely features in a marketplace label and can single-handedly cap a numeric grade.
Where our app stops, and why
TCG Card Grading Scanner Value lets you save identified cards with their variant details and record a condition note against an entry. It does not assign a condition, and it does not assign a grade.
The line we drew is between measurement and judgement, and it is a real distinction rather than a cautious one.
Centring is measurement. Four borders, two ratios per face, arithmetic — the method is in how to measure card centring, and a phone can do it because the answer is a number derived from a photograph.
Condition is judgement. "Minor edge wear", "a few slight flaws", "noticeable imperfections", "structurally compromised" — these are assessments made by a person against published criteria, involving raking light, magnification and the card in the hand. A model looking at a single photograph taken under unknown lighting is not doing that, and a confident condition label produced that way would be wrong often enough to cost someone money on a listing or a submission.
So the app records what you decide, attached to the entry, alongside the variant and the value estimate. That is genuinely less impressive than a one-tap condition grade, and it is the version we can stand behind. The app says the same thing in its own words: grading estimates are informational only, and an official grade requires an independent professional grading service.
How to use the two systems together
- Selling raw? Use the marketplace's own published standards, read on the day, and grade yourself strictly. The cost of over-describing a card is a return and a reputation.
- Considering submission? Read the grading company's published scale and be honest about where the card sits before you look at fees. The break-even arithmetic in is my card worth grading collapses if you assume a grade you will not get, and the published fees in what grading costs and what the tiers buy you are committed regardless of outcome.
- Comparing two copies? Measure rather than judge. Centring is the one factor you can settle objectively at a kitchen table.
- Recording a collection? Note the condition in your own words and keep the variant with it — reverse holo versus holo covers why the variant is not a cosmetic detail.
And whichever system you are using, read it from the organisation's current page rather than from memory or a forum. Both marketplaces and graders revise their standards, and a summary written a year ago is a historical document.
Our scanner sits with the rest of the studio's practical Android tools under Video & Utility Apps.
Good to know
Frequently asked questions
What does Near Mint actually mean?
How do marketplace labels map onto numeric grades?
What separates Lightly Played from Moderately Played?
Can a flawless card still be Damaged?
Who sets these standards?
Sources
- Card Conditioning Overview (opens in a new tab)TCGplayer — accessed
- CGC Cards Grading Scale (opens in a new tab)CGC Cards — accessed
- PSA Grading Standards (opens in a new tab)Professional Sports Authenticator (PSA) — accessed
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