Coin Grades

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Our Approach

    Coin grading is a subjective art and one that often leads to disagreement.

As with approaches in many walks of life, some people will focus more on the positive aspects and some more on the negative when it comes to grading a coin.

At OldEnglishCoins, we believe in giving an honest appraisal, highlighting any points of interest for the collector, both good and bad. This means that we will endeavour to describe the areas and level of any wear or scratches whilst also commenting on the coin's lustre and any particularly attractive features.

The Grades

    Fleur-de-Coin (FDC)
    A flawless coin, free from any wear, scratches or fingerprints

    Uncirculated (Unc)
    A coin in superb condition, as new, although not necessarily perfect

    Extremely Fine (EF)
    Slight wear or markings on coin, noticeable upon close inspection

    Very Fine (VF)
    Some wear visible but much detail retained

    Fine (F)
    Considerable wear to raised surfaces but major detail still sharp

    Fair (fr)
    Very worn but lettering and main features visible

"Good" and "Almost"

    Good (G) and Almost (a) are prefixes given to help grade the coin more accurately. We use Good to mean "better than" so a coin graded as GF would be better than Fine.
Almost means close to a certain grade so, aEF would mean nearly Extremely Fine.

The below shows an example of grades, increasing in quality:

Very Fine (VF) → Good Very Fine (GVF) → Almost Extremely Fine (aEF) → Extremely Fine (EF)

Other Factors

    Other factors affecting a coin's grade include its age and how rarely it is found in a certain condition.

For this reason, a 100 year old coin graded VF issued in the millions would normally be expected to have less wear than a scarce 1000 year old coin also graded VF.