Is grading Pokémon cards worth it?

PSA's scale, at the top

PSA's grading standards define a Gem Mint 10 as “a virtually perfect card,” with four sharp corners, sharp focus and full original gloss, centered within about 55/45 to 60/40 on the front and 75/25 on the reverse, allowing at most a slight printing imperfection. A Mint 9 shows “only one” minor flaw, such as a slight wax stain on the reverse or slightly off-white borders, and centering of about 60/40 to 65/35 on the front and 90/10 on the back. An NM-MT 8 allows slight wear on the corners and centering nearer 70/30. Below that the grades run through Near Mint 7, EX-MT 6 and down to Poor 1, with half grades in between and qualifiers such as OC for off-centre. CGC and Beckett grade on their own ten-point scales with their own top-grade labels.

What it cost in 2026

PSA's fees moved several times in 2026. Its Value levels, which had started around $25 to $30 a card, were paused for new submissions from 2 June 2026 when, by PSA's own account, a surge in submissions pushed its backlog toward ten million cards; the cheapest open level became Regular at $79.99 a card, with Express and faster levels above it, and PSA tied the Value levels' return to a backlog milestone rather than a date. Whatever the level, add return shipping and insurance, and weeks to months of waiting. CGC and Beckett price their own levels. Check the graders' sites before submitting; these numbers are as of September 2026 and will not stay put.

The arithmetic

Take the raw Near Mint price for the print. Find recent sold prices for the same print at PSA 9 and PSA 10. Estimate honestly which grade your copy would get: a 10 needs near-perfect centering and corners under magnification, and most cards pulled from packs are 9s or 8s. Then: graded price at the likely grade, minus the fee, minus shipping both ways, minus the raw price. If the result is not clearly positive at a 9, do not send it. For a $5 card the fee is the whole story; for a vintage holo, a modern chase card or anything that sells for hundreds raw, the grade can double the price or more, and the sum works.

When grading makes sense

Usually one of these:

• A card whose raw price already justifies the fee several times over, where a high grade adds a premium and a slab adds trust for the buyer.
• A card you intend to keep, where the slab is protection and authentication rather than an investment.
• A card whose authenticity a buyer will question, since graders authenticate before they grade.
• A modern chase card pulled fresh from a pack with flawless corners, where a 10 is realistic and the 10 premium is large.

How the app fits in

The app prices raw cards, and that is the starting number for the sum: TCGplayer's Market Price and Cardmarket's Trend for the print, on the card's page, with the time they were read. It records the condition you assign, which is your first, honest estimate of the grade. For the graded side you need sold listings on the marketplaces and the graders' own population reports, which show how many 10s and 9s exist for a card and therefore how scarce a top grade really is.