The 2024 State of Card Grading Report

It's no surprise that PSA is the big winner here. In the first half of 2023 alone PSA graded over 6.4 million cards out of an industry total of roughly 8 million. SGC seems to have picked up quite a bit of steam recently, both in our survey and in the graded card data which now shows them with ~7% market share.

Trust in grading companies is the hot-button topic of the year. With reports of graded cards being cracked out of their cases, resubmitted, and receiving wildly different grades as well as rumors of collusion between some grading companies and well-heeled collectors, the market is wary.

Artificial intelligence (AI) grading should begin to alleviate some of that frustration as TAG, HGA, and EDGE gain traction with their machine learning-based grading systems. PSA's purchase of Genamint, an AI grading platform, means that the industry's largest grader may also begin to dip its toes into machine grading. It remains to be seen whether AI will be able to accurately handle the millions of variations present in such a wide variety of cards spanning over a century of collecting without at least some human assistance.

There has also been a push for grading companies to provide more transparency into the grading process. BGS introduced subgrades for each of the 4 main areas of a card (centering, surface, edges, and corners) in 1999, a feature which has become quite common among newer companies. Some newer grading providers are even providing high-resolutions images of the card included online to give customers and future buyers a closer look at the graded card's condition.

Grading turnaround time comes in as the grading feature voted least important. It's a polarizing topic because on one hand collectors have become used to long wait times ever since the coronavirus ground the grading industry to a near standstill in 2020. On the other hand, grading seems to many like a process that shouldn't require a 60 day wait time. Companies have been working to create efficiencies in the grading process to bring these wait times down... but are also not necessarily incentivized to do so if customers don't mind the wait and grading companies can upcharge for faster service.

It's also interesting to note that 5% of collectors surveyed consider "Trust in the accuracy of the grade" the least important feature of grading. It can be assumed that some subset of collectors grade cards for their personal collections and just want the card to be protected. The grade on the label just doesn't matter as much in this scenario.

Since their earliest experiences in the hobby, many collectors' eyes have instinctively gone straight to the 4 corners when they want to assess a card's condition. Along with centering, corners are arguably one of the easiest attributes to grade. A card either has 4 sharp corners or it doesn't. It is either mathematically centered or it isn't. Surface, in particular, can leave a little bit more room for interpretation. This showed in the survey where only 22% of the respondents chose the card surface as the most important quality to consider when grading.

While grading companies do consider the condition of the back of the card, it is typically not as critical as the front. They will evaluate the back for issues such as creases, surface wear, stains, print defects, and other flaws that may affect the card's overall condition. However, the primary emphasis is on the front because that is what most collectors prioritize when assessing the visual appeal and value of a card. The results of this survey question would support the idea that collectors believe the condition of a card's back to be important, but not vital, to a card's overall grade.

This is the topic that has the most variation among grading companies. Centering measurements are represented as a percentage. If the left border and right border of a card both measure 3mm in thickness then that card would be said to have 50/50 left/right centering since each border takes up 50% of the total left/right border measurement. The leading card grading company, PSA, allows up to 75/25 centering on the back of a card for a grade of Gem Mint 10. In contrast, SGC requires a 55/45 or better centering percentage on the back of the card for a possible Gem Mint grade.

The survey showed that a whopping 88% of respondents do not consider the centering of the back of a card vital to the card's overall grade.

To set up the motivation for this question, we first need a little background: Way back in the early 1990s the very first card grader, Accugrade, introduced the 10 point grading scale. A grade of 9 was considered "Mint" and a 10 was called "Gem Mint." PSA came along a few years later using the same scale, which can still be seen on their graded cards today. In 1999, Beckett Grading Services (BGS) threw a little bit of a wrench in the industry. With the idea that some cards could be higher than Gem Mint, BGS created a "Pristine" designation. But rather than stick with the industry standard, BGS made a 10 "Pristine," and a 9.5 "Gem Mint." Other companies like HGA have followed the BGS model leading to an industry without a standardized scale.

So what do collectors prefer? According to the survey, 45% of collectors consider "Mint Condition" to mean a grade of 9.

Similar to the previous question, survey respondents view the original definition of Gem Mint, a card graded 10/10, as the correct one. Interestingly, only 6% or collectors surveyed prefer to use 9.5 as the grading standard for a Gem Mint card even though 2 of the 6 top grading companies (BGS and HGA) use 9.5 as their Gem Mint designation.

Collectors are just about evenly split on whether or not there should be a grade above Gem Mint for cards that are "a cut above." BGS, SGC, HGA, and Edge Grading all have a designation above Gem Mint. BGS has the Black Label Pristine 10. SGC has the 10 Pristine Gold Label. HGA has a 10 Pristine as well as a 10 Flawless and Edge Grading has the 10+ Ultramint.

With the industry split on what centering percentages warrant Mint and Gem Mint grades it was interesting to see that most of the collectors surveyed consider 60/40 centering worthy of a 9 or lower. PSA considers cards up to 60/40 centering for their Gem Mint 10 designation.

61% of collectors surveyed find 55/45 centering worthy of a 10. It is also clear that for a card to grade above a 10 collectors would like to see centering closer to 50/50 as only 4% thought 55/65 would warrant a "Pristine" or "Ultramint" grade.

With the rise in subgrades being used to help collectors better understand why their cards were graded the way they were, questions have often been asked about the formulas used to calculate a card's final grade. Sometimes a card with an 8 subgrade can receive a final grade of 9. Is this what collectors believe is accurate? According to the survey, yes, with 86% of respondents believing that the grade should go up at least a half point to 8.5 and 78% believing it should go up at least a full point to 9 or better.

It is clear that among collectors who responded to our survey the vast majority (82%) believe that having a card graded and sealed in a protective case currently increases the look and feel of the card.