How to Get Sports Cards Graded in Just 8 Simple Steps

Written by in Card GradingLast Updated

Collectors and flippers alike often get their cards graded in order to increase value or to better protect them. They also look great for displaying.

But the process can be a little daunting (I remember my first time), and so I’ve put together this post to help walk you through the process.

8 Steps to Grading Sports Cards

Here are the steps to getting your sports cards graded:

  1. Are Your Cards Worth It?
  2. Decide Which Grading Company to Go With
  3. Determine if You Want a Bulk Submitter
  4. Place an Order
  5. Clean Your Cards
  6. Put Cards in Semi-Rigid Holders
  7. Package Them Securely
  8. Wait!

Let’s jump in.

1. Are Your Cards Worth Grading?

To be the bearer of bad news, MOST of your cards are not worth getting graded. Of my 6k cards from the 90s, I ended up grading about a dozen of them. And about 6 of those were next to worthless when they came back because it took so long and the absolute boom of ‘21 was over.

There are three things involved in making the grading decision:

  1. What is the likely grade your card will get? 
  2. Does that likely grade increase the value of your card enough to make it worth the cost/hassle/wait?
  3. Or do you care about none of those things and just a card you like to have a cool holder?

Those are all in-depth questions that I answer elsewhere:

=> How Do I Know if My Cards Are Worth Grading

=> How to Calculate How Much Graded Cards Are Worth

As for getting your cards preserved in a cool holder? It’s $20 or more to get your card graded and takes months. You can buy sweet magnetic holders for under $2 a pop.

2. Decide Which Grading Company to Go With

So, you’ve got some cards that you’re pretty darn sure are worth grading…cool! That’s exciting—I love sending in cards to get graded.

But which company do you go with?

There’s a long answer and a short answer.

The short answer is: PSA. 90% of the time, PSA is the right way to go.

This is because PSA:

The only real downside is that PSA takes longer than the other companies (I’m referring mostly to the Big Three companies – PSA, SGC, and BGS).

SGC can get your cards back to you super fast. When new products come out, pulled cards always sell for higher at first. So if you can rip a box, send cards in, get them back from SGC in like 1-2 weeks, you can usually sell them at a premium.

In pretty much all other cases, I would go PSA. Such as:

  1. You’re grading anything that isn’t brand new
  2. You’re grading cards that you want to hold for a later flip (like someone you think will go up in value later)

Basically, whenever time isn’t a huge factor, there’s pretty much no reason not to go with PSA.

3. Determine if Want to Use a Bulk Submitter

A bulk submitter is a company that regularly ships out large quantities of cards to grading companies for many clients, and they get discounts for doing so.

Sometimes, these bulk submitters will even evaluate cards for you and send back the ones that aren’t worth grading. This is how I usually submit, because it’s a crazy valuable service.

My favorite is Nashcards (no I’m not an affiliate of theirs…just a great service).

In order to unlock the $19/card pricing at PSA, you have to submit 20 cards. However, if you submit to a company like Nashcards, you can still get the $19 price even if you submit a single card.

Plus, you can have cards professionally reviewed for $4. This means that any cards that they don’t think will grade well will just be sent back to you. This saves you a FORTUNE…after all, what if you send in several cards at $19 a pop that grade out as a 6 or 7?

It’s almost always worth going with a bulk submitter.

4. Place Order

Now it’s a simple matter of selecting the service level you want, logging your cards, and placing an order!

This will often look something like this:

The trickiest part would probably be the Attributes/SN section. For base cards, this section gets left blank.

If the card is an insert, a short print, or a parallel, you’d fill in the details there.

Here’s a card I got graded:

For this one, I put “The Mighty Mirror Gold 6/10” – because this one is an insert, a parallel, AND a numbered short print. 

Once you have all your cards inputted, usually this is when you submit your order and get further instructions for how to send in your cards.

5. Clean Your Cards

Some people in the hobby are split on this, and I fall somewhere in the middle. Some people heavily clean their cards, while others refuse to touch them.

But my question is this:

Why would you want a fingerprint or a stray piece of dust encapsulated on your card forever? Not to mention likely hurting your grade?

The only thing that I do is take a microfiber cloth and very carefully wipe down the surface. This is where most card collectors fall, too.

6. Put Cards in Semi-Rigid Holders

These are semi-rigid card holders (sometimes called Card Savers):

Most card grading companies used to have a requirements that all cards be submitted using these holders, but they’ve mostly relaxed.

However, it’s still highly recommended because it’s easier to get cards out of these….

So to me, it’s required. I keep a stack of these on hand for no other reason than to send in for grading.

7. Package Cards Securely

Once the cards are in semi-rigid holders, most graders like you to send the cards in the order you logged them.

So if I have 10 cards or so, I stack them in the correct order and then put a rubber band around them (obviously not too tight!).

Then, I package them in a way that it’s nearly impossible for them to be destroyed. Here’s what I do:

  1. Always surround your cards with cardboard. I cut out two pieces that are a little bigger than the cards, put one on each end of your stack, and then tape the cardboard together. Done right, the tape won’t even touch the holders.
  2. Put cards in a box. I never send cards to be graded in an envelope of any kind—too much can go wrong.
  3. Pack box securely. Whenever I get packages in the mail, I keep the bubble wrap or filler paper. Then when I need to pack a box like this, I can make sure everything is safe and snug.
  4. Include your printout. Every submission I’ve made requires printing out a packing slip and including it in the box so that your list of cards accompanies the cards themselves. Don’t forget this!

Free tip: Use Pirateship.com to pay for shipping. Cheaper than the post office and takes seconds to print out a label.

8. Wait!

And now… you wait! This always sucks. The first shipments I sent in took over a year, and it was torture.

Now at least you can get cards back pretty quick, from a week or two with SGC to a few months with PSA. 

But man, there’s nothing like getting that box back and opening up your newly graded cards. 

What is the Best Card Grading Service?

The best service depends on what you’re looking for. Here are a few categories:

  1. For Resale Value – PSA
  2. For Quick Turnarounds – SGC
  3. For Subgrades – BGS
  4. Strictest Grading Standards – SGC
  5. For Holy Grail Values – BGS
  6. For Display/PC – HGA

Read more => What is the Best Card Grading Service?

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