PSA 10 Success Rates by Sport, 2024–2026 (24,000 Cards Analyzed)

Original-data research from GradingMetric. Dataset: 24,000+ trading cards analyzed by the GradingMetric AI grading model between 2024 and Q1 2026, with documented PSA grading outcomes. Last updated May 12, 2026.

Key Findings

• Overall PSA 10 success rate across the dataset: approximately 18.7% — meaning fewer than 1 in 5 cards submitted to PSA earn a Gem Mint grade.
• Modern basketball rookies (2022–2025) outperform all other sports on PSA 10 rate, at ~24.1%.
• Modern baseball, in contrast, hits PSA 10 only ~16.3% of the time — centering on flagship sets (Topps Chrome, Bowman Chrome) is the most common downgrade reason.
• Modern Pokemon (Scarlet & Violet era) shows a PSA 10 rate of ~21.5%, with edge whitening on dark-bordered cards being the top reason for PSA 9 outcomes.
• Vintage cards (pre-1990) cap at ~3.8% PSA 10 rate in the dataset, with PSA 8 and PSA 9 representing the more realistic ceiling for most submissions.
• Cards that GradingMetric flagged as a "Submit" verdict (Capital Score 65+) hit PSA 10 at approximately 41% — more than double the baseline rate.

Methodology

This study draws from a dataset of 24,000+ trading cards uploaded to GradingMetric's AI grading platform between January 2024 and March 2026 where the user provided a documented PSA grade outcome after submission. Cards were grouped by sport/category, year of release, and grading service tier. PSA 10 success rate is defined as the percentage of cards in a cohort that received a PSA 10 grade upon return.

The dataset skews modern (post-2015 releases represent ~78% of the corpus) and toward rookies and flagship sets where AI pre-grading is most commonly used. Vintage cohorts are smaller, so per-set figures for pre-1990 cards should be treated as directional rather than precise. All figures are rounded to one decimal place.

PSA 10 Success Rate by Sport (Modern, 2022–2025)

Sport / category	Sample size	PSA 10 rate	PSA 9 rate	PSA 8 or lower
Basketball	4,210	24.1%	42.8%	33.1%
Pokemon (modern)	5,640	21.5%	45.3%	33.2%
Football	3,180	19.7%	41.6%	38.7%
Soccer	1,090	18.4%	43.2%	38.4%
Baseball	3,920	16.3%	40.9%	42.8%
MTG	820	15.8%	42.1%	42.1%
Yu-Gi-Oh	490	13.2%	39.8%	47.0%

Basketball's lead is driven by Panini Prizm and Donruss Optic flagship rookies, where centering tolerances are typically tighter than baseball's Topps Chrome and surface defects are less common than on Pokemon holos. The lowest PSA 10 rate in modern is Yu-Gi-Oh — driven primarily by surface and print-line defects on Konami stock that AI flags reliably but that collectors often miss visually.

PSA 10 Success Rate by Era

Era	Years	Sample size	PSA 10 rate	Most common downgrade reason
Modern	2015–2025	18,720	20.2%	Centering
Junk Wax	1986–1994	1,860	9.4%	Print defects / surface
Late Vintage	1970–1985	2,140	5.6%	Corner wear
Vintage	1950–1969	950	3.8%	Surface / corners
Pre-war	Before 1950	330	2.1%	Edge wear / surface

Vintage cards face structural limits on PSA 10 odds because production tolerances on older cards rarely meet the centering and surface requirements of modern Gem Mint standards. For pre-1990 cards, PSA 8 is often a far more realistic target than PSA 10, and the financial spread between PSA 7 and PSA 8 can rival the modern PSA 9-to-10 jump.

Top Downgrade Reasons (All Cards)

• Centering (47% of all PSA 9 outcomes): 60/40 to 65/35 centering — looks fine to the eye but caps at PSA 9.
• Corner wear (24%): Microscopic fuzzing or whitening at one or more corners.
• Edge whitening (17%): Especially prevalent on dark-bordered Pokemon, Prizm Silver, and Bowman Chrome.
• Surface defects (8%): Print lines, scratches, fingerprints, and gloss inconsistencies.
• Combined / multi-factor (4%): Two or more borderline factors stacking.

Centering is by far the largest gap between collector expectation and PSA outcome. About 47% of cards that the dataset's owners predicted as PSA 10 candidates received PSA 9 specifically because of centering, even though the card otherwise had clean corners, edges, and surface.

Capital Score Predictive Power

The Capital Score is GradingMetric's 0-100 submit-or-hold verdict, combining grade probabilities, market value, and grading cost into a single number. In this dataset, the relationship between Capital Score band and actual PSA 10 outcome is striking.

Capital Score band	Verdict	Sample size	Actual PSA 10 rate
85–100	Strong submit	1,820	52.4%
65–84	Submit	4,610	34.7%
45–64	Borderline	6,720	16.1%
25–44	Hold	7,310	5.8%
0–24	Strong hold	3,540	1.4%

Cards scoring in the 85–100 band hit PSA 10 at about 52% — roughly 2.8x the dataset baseline. Cards in the 0–24 band hit PSA 10 at 1.4%. Read against PSA's economy service all-in cost of roughly $40 per card, this is the difference between expected profit and expected loss on a per-card basis. Read more about the metric in the Capital Score explainer.

What This Means for Submission Strategy

• Pre-screening pays. The 41% PSA 10 rate on Submit-verdict cards versus 18.7% baseline means roughly 2x more PSA 10s per dollar of grading fee when collectors pre-screen.
• Centering is the cheapest fix. Almost half of PSA 9 outcomes are centering-driven and most of those cards could be replaced with better-centered copies for less than the cost of grading.
• Sport matters less than you think. The spread from worst sport (Yu-Gi-Oh) to best (basketball) is about 11 percentage points. The spread from Submit-verdict to Hold-verdict is over 40 percentage points. Capital Score selection dominates sport selection.
• Vintage requires different math. A 3.8% PSA 10 rate on pre-1969 cards means the financial case for grading vintage almost always rests on the 8-to-9 or 9-to-10 spread being meaningful at lower grade outcomes — not on chasing Gem Mint.

Sport-Level Detail: Baseball

Within baseball, the data reveals a centering problem on flagship modern sets. 2022–2024 Topps Chrome rookies hit PSA 10 at 14.1% in the dataset — well below the basketball comparable. Bowman Chrome Prospects hit 12.8%. Topps Series 1 base parallels (Gold, Rainbow Foil) hit 19.4%. The cleaner the print run's centering tolerance, the higher the PSA 10 rate — collectors targeting maximum ROI should bias toward parallels with documented better centering rather than flagship base rookies.

Sport-Level Detail: Pokemon

The modern Pokemon PSA 10 rate of 21.5% blends several sub-cohorts. Scarlet & Violet base set holos hit ~24% PSA 10. Special Illustration Rares hit ~19% — the gold-bordered cards in particular suffer from edge whitening. Japanese Pokemon hit ~28% PSA 10, reflecting tighter production tolerances at TPCi Japan than at the US printer.

Sport-Level Detail: Basketball

Modern Panini Prizm Silver rookies (2022–2024) hit PSA 10 at ~26% in the dataset. Donruss Optic Holo rookies hit ~28%. National Treasures rookie patch autos (much smaller sample) hit ~18%, reflecting the centering challenge on bookend-style designs. The 30-PSA-10-per-100 ceiling on flagship basketball is roughly 1.5x baseball's equivalent.

Caveats

• The dataset reflects cards collectors chose to pre-grade. There is positive selection bias — collectors do not typically pre-grade cards they are confident will fail. Absolute PSA 10 rates in the broader submission pool are likely lower than the figures above.
• PSA grading standards evolve. Periods of stricter or more lenient grading can shift rates over time. These figures are 2024–Q1 2026 averages.
• Sample sizes vary by cohort. Per-set figures with samples under 500 should be read as directional.

Citations & Reuse

If you cite this data, please reference GradingMetric (https://www.gradingmetric.com/blog/psa-10-success-rates-2026). The underlying dataset is GradingMetric's AI grading model dataset, 24,000+ cards, 2024–Q1 2026, US PSA submissions. For methodology questions, see our contact page.