Guides

Comic book grades on eBay and Whatnot: the ten point scale, raw copies, slabs, and what each field takes

By Winston, Comic Collector Enthusiast. 28 September 2026.

Comic sellers grade on one scale, from 10.0 at the top to 0.5 at the bottom, and the grading companies print it on every slab. Buyers read it, search with it and argue about it. What changes from one marketplace to the next is where the grade goes: eBay has three item specifics that are really for slabs, Whatnot has a condition ladder of its own, and a raw comic's grade ends up in words either way.

This is the scale, what each field takes, and where a raw comic's grade belongs.

The ten point scale

These are the grades on CGC's published scale, with what CGC writes beside each number: a name at 10.0, 9.9 and 0.5, a short code in between. The eBay column spells every code out. Between two grades, grade down: a buyer who gets a better book than the listing said rarely complains, and one who gets a worse one opens a case.

The last two columns are what Point and Sell writes, and they are worked out by the same code that builds the files. The eBay column is for a slabbed comic only (the next section says why). The Whatnot column is the condition a raw comic gets on Whatnot when its grade box holds that grade, typed as the number or as CGC's code.

The trade also writes some of these differently from CGC: GD for Good, FR for Fair and PR for Poor, as in GD/VG and FR/GD. Both spellings are read the same way.

On eBay, a raw comic's grade goes in words

eBay's comic book category, 259104, has an item specific called Grade, and its list is the scale above in eBay's own spelling, from 0.5 Poor to 10 Gem Mint. Beside it sit Professional Grader, whose list is Certified Guaranty Company (CGC), Comic Book Certification Service (CBCS), Professional Grading Experts (PGX), Professional Sports Authenticator (PSA), and Certification Number, which is free text. eBay's Taxonomy API marks Grade and Professional Grader as selection only (eBay takes a value from its own list and nothing else) and all three as recommended, not required.

Those three describe a slab: a grade a company printed on a label, with a number anyone can look up. A raw comic has a grade you gave it, and the place for that is the condition description, the few lines eBay shows beside the item condition, and the start of your description. Write the grade and what you saw: "VF 8.0, light spine stress, white pages". The graded comics guide covers slabs in full.

eBay also asks for an item condition on every listing, from a short list of its own that is not a comic grade at all. Pick the one that fits, and let the grade in your words carry the detail a comic buyer reads.

On Whatnot, the ladder has ten steps

Whatnot's comic categories take one condition from a ladder of their own: Graded, Gem Mint, Mint, Near Mint, Very Fine, Fine, Very Good, Good, Fair, Poor. Graded is for a slab. The rest are the scale in whole steps, with nothing between them, so a 9.0 and a 9.8 are both Near Mint there. Put the number in the description, where a buyer at a live show will read it.

How Point and Sell fits in

Nothing on the site grades a comic from its photographs. Every grade is one you state.

A raw comic. Each row on the review screen has a Grade box. Type the grade as the number, the short code or the name, or leave it empty to use your Default grade from Settings, which is blank on a new account until you set one. The grade is in the first line of the listing description as you typed it ("VF condition range."), and goes into the eBay condition description too if your condition line in Settings has {grade} in it (the line a new account starts with does not). It is not written into eBay's Grade item specific. The eBay item condition is the one you pick in Settings for every comic: Very Good (4000), Like New (2750), Good (5000), Acceptable (6000), Brand New (1000). Only Very Good has been through a real upload from here. The Whatnot file reads the same box onto Whatnot's ladder, as the table shows.

A Grade box holding something that is not a grade (a stray paste, a note like "tear on back cover") is not read as one. A setting decides what happens then: use your default grade, or write no condition sentence at all. Either way the batch page names the row, so you can type the real grade before the file goes.

A slab. Tick graded on the row and type the grader, the grade and the certification number from the label. The file then fills eBay's Grade, Professional Grader and Certification Number, in eBay's own values: a CGC 9.8 goes as 9.8 Near Mint/Mint and Certified Guaranty Company (CGC). A slab from a grader that is not on eBay's list, or with a grade that is not on the scale, gets Grade and Professional Grader left blank, the batch page says which row and why, and the certification number, the title and the description still carry the label as you typed it.

What it does not do, as of today. It does not grade, estimate or suggest a grade. It does not write eBay's Grade item specific for a raw comic. And no slab listed from here has been through a live eBay upload yet, so check the first graded listing goes live with its Grade and Professional Grader filled before you send a case of them.

Try it on a box · Is it worth grading? · More guides

Sources

The scale and what CGC writes beside each grade are from CGC's own grading scale page, read on 28 September 2026. eBay's values for Grade and Professional Grader, and whether each is required, were read from eBay's Taxonomy API for category 259104 on 27 September 2026; the eBay column above is rendered from that reading. Whatnot's ladder is as the Whatnot guide gives it. The advice to grade down and where to write a raw grade is one working seller's practice, not a rule. What Point and Sell does is its code on the day this was published.