Roughly 1,900 searches a year reach this site asking what PSA actually is. "What is psa in pokemon cards", "what is psa pokemon", "what does psa 10 mean". They rank between position 9 and 17, and they get zero clicks.
Zero. Not a few. None.
That is what happens when someone asks a beginner question and the page Google offers them opens with a paragraph about an AI project. So this is the page that just answers it.
The one paragraph version
PSA is a company that inspects trading cards, decides how good the condition is, gives it a number from 1 to 10, and seals it in a tamper-proof plastic case with that number on a label. The number is the grade. The case is called a slab. A sealed card sells for more than a loose one, because the buyer no longer has to trust the seller's description.
That is the whole idea. Everything else is detail.
What the letters stand for
PSA stands for Professional Sports Authenticator. It started with sports cards in 1991 and now grades Pokémon among a lot of other things, which is why a Pokémon card carries a label from a company with "sports" in its name.
You will see other graders mentioned. CGC and Beckett do the same job with their own scales and their own slabs. PSA is the largest, and for Pokémon it generally commands the highest prices, which is why it dominates the conversation.
What the number means
The scale runs 1 to 10. Higher is better, and the gaps are not evenly spaced.
| Grade | Name | In plain terms |
|---|---|---|
| 10 | Gem Mint | Nothing wrong that a grader could find |
| 9 | Mint | Exactly one small thing |
| 8 | NM-MT | Minor wear if you look for it |
| 7 | NM | Light wear you notice without looking |
| 6 | EX-MT | Obvious handling, maybe a light crease |
| 5 | EX | Rounded corners, real edge wear |
| 4 | VG-EX | Multiple flaws, creasing |
| 3 | VG | Heavy creases, clear damage |
| 2 | Good | Significant damage, card complete |
| 1 | Poor | Severe damage, tears, missing pieces |
The thing beginners find hardest to believe: the difference between a 10 and a 9 is often invisible to you. A corner tip slightly soft under magnification. A fifth of a millimetre of border. And the price difference can be several times over.
I wrote a page showing what each grade actually looks like, because words are a poor format for this question.
What they are looking at
Four things, judged separately: centering, corners, edges, surface. Your grade is essentially capped by whichever is worst, so a card with three perfect categories and one bad one is graded on the bad one.
- Centering is how evenly the artwork sits inside the borders. It's the only one you can measure yourself, and it's the most common reason a card misses a 10. How to measure it.
- Corners take every impact and show it first.
- Edges show whitening, chipping and fraying, especially on dark-bordered cards.
- Surface covers scratches, print lines, dents, creases and loss of gloss.
Something worth knowing early, because most guides never say it: PSA does not publish numeric tolerances for any of this. No maximum whitening, no centering percentage on their current standards page. The figures you'll see quoted everywhere are hobby consensus. What PSA does say, in writing, is that grading has a subjective component and that graders weigh eye appeal against what the market expects for that particular card.
What the plastic case is actually for
Three jobs, and only one of them is protection.
It certifies. The label carries a certification number you can look up. The grade is attached to that specific card, permanently.
It prevents swapping. The case is sonically sealed. Getting the card out means destroying the case, which is the point.
It protects. Genuinely, but that's the least important part. A card in a five-cent sleeve is protected too.
The case is a trust device. It lets someone buy a card from a stranger without inspecting it, and that is what makes graded cards liquid in a way raw cards are not.
How to read the label
Once you know what's on it, a slab label tells you most of what you need.
The grade and its name. "GEM-MT 10", "MINT 9", "NM-MT 8". The word and the number say the same thing.
The certification number. A unique number for that specific card in that specific case. You can look it up on PSA's site to confirm the slab is what it claims to be, which is the first thing to do when buying a graded card from a stranger.
The card's details. Year, set, card name and number. Worth reading carefully, because a slab for a common reprint and a slab for the original look identical at a glance.
Qualifiers, if present. Two letters after the grade: OC off-centre, ST stain, PD print defect, MK mark. A qualifier means the card was otherwise better than that grade but has one specific flaw called out. A qualified card is worth less than a clean one at the same number, so an "8 OC" is not an 8 in price terms.
A red label rather than the usual one signals a special designation. Most cards you'll see have the standard label.
What it costs, and whether it's worth it
This is where beginners get hurt, so plainly:
PSA's Regular service is currently $79.99 per card with a 40 to 50 business day turnaround, and their value tier is paused. Prices move, so check before you send anything.
At that price the maths is simple and unkind. A card needs to be worth substantially more graded than raw, plus eighty dollars, plus two months of waiting. For most cards out of most packs, it isn't close.
And the honest framing nobody offers: assume you'll get a 9, not a 10. If the numbers only work at a 10, you're gambling, not investing.
Things that will get your card rejected
Unlike the grading criteria, PSA is precise here. These aren't low grades, they're refusals, and the card comes back documented as altered:
- N1 Trimming, if an edge looks cut
- N3 Recoloration, if colour looks artificially improved
- N7 Cleaning, if a whitener was used on the borders
- N4, if it appears counterfeit
Which brings up the question everyone asks next: no, you cannot fix whitening on a card, and every method people try has a dedicated rejection code waiting for it.
So should you get your cards graded
Most people reading this should not, and that's a fine answer.
Grade a card if it's genuinely valuable raw, if you're confident it's in excellent condition, and if you've checked what a 9 of that card actually sells for. Otherwise a good sleeve and a toploader gives you almost all of the protection and none of the cost.
The cards worth grading are usually the ones you already suspect are worth grading. If you're unsure, that's typically the answer.
The thought I keep landing on
Grading turns a card into a financial instrument. That's the honest description. The number and the sealed case exist so that a card can be traded by people who never see it, which is useful, and which also puts the card in a box where you can never touch it again.
There's a version of this hobby where the best possible outcome for a piece of cardboard is that nobody ever holds it. Worth noticing that's the direction, before you send off something you actually like.
Sources
- PSA grading standards, for the no-grade definitions and the statements on subjectivity and eye appeal. Checked 10 August 2026.
- PSA trading card grading service levels and pricing. Checked 10 August 2026, and these change.
- Search query data is my own, from Google Search Console for coffeeandfun.com, 9 April 2025 to 8 August 2026.