Near Mint
NM- Minimal wear from shuffling, play, or handling
- Nearly unmarked surface, crisp corners, unblemished edges
- May have slight edge wear or a couple of minor scratches
- Looks and feels essentially unplayed
Buying guide
Same card, two rulebooks.Here's how we grade it.
How TierZero grades cards, how our scale compares to the official North American and European standards, and real photo examples of every grade.
North American and European grading scales don't line up the way people assume — a card called EX under the European standard is very often what North American buyers expect from MP, not LP. This guide lays out both official scales side by side, shows exactly where they diverge, and sets the standard we use for buying, stocking, and grading every listing.
Our productsSide by side
Where the two scales actually diverge
The scales aren't offset by one clean step — the gap opens up in the middle and gets worse the more worn a card is. Select a grade to see how it is treated on both sides of the Atlantic.
- North America (TCGplayer)
- TierZero Grade
- Europe (Cardmarket)
North America (TCGplayer)
Europe (Cardmarket)
TierZero Grade
North America
TCGplayer scale
Lightly Played
LP- Minor edge wear, scuffs, or scratches
- No significant imperfections and no structural issues
- A handful of noticeable imperfections is fine, provided none is severe or there isn't a high volume of them
Moderately Played
MP- Edge wear, surface wear, scratching or scuffing
- Bends with creases are acceptable
- Minor peeling or liquid exposure is acceptable if the card's structure isn't compromised
Heavily Played
HP- A major amount of wear — moderate imperfections plus creasing and whitening
- Can carry severe imperfections as long as they don't affect structural integrity
- Must still be authenticatable; cannot be structurally damaged
Damaged
DMG- Wear beyond every other grade: major border loss, tears, splitting, or any damage affecting the card's structural integrity
- Cards with foreign substances (food, liquid, etc.) can't be sold at all, in any condition
Europe
Cardmarket scale
Mint
M- Perfect condition, no exceptions — completely clean front, no scratches
- Rarely used in practice; most unplayed modern singles are listed as Near Mint instead
Near Mint
NM- Functions as "Near Mint or better," similar to a combined NM/M grade
- Tiny production blemishes are fine: a couple of small white corner spots from cutting, or a minor scratch that hasn't removed any colour
- Any visible clouding rules out Near Mint
Excellent
EX- Clearly not perfect on inspection, but the damage is limited in severity
- White spots or wear on corners and edges
- Faint surface scratches allowed if not obvious under normal light
- Any crease visible at first glance rules out Excellent
Good
GD- Looks like it's been played without sleeves for a long stretch — a full tournament, say
- Clear wear across multiple areas of the card
- More pronounced corner/edge whitening, plus light surface scratches or dirt
Light Played
LP- A more extreme version of Good — played for a long period without sleeves
- Noticeable, sometimes heavy whitening along the edges and borders
- Still tournament-legal
Played
PL- Substantial wear; may be creased, dinged, or scratched
- Rule of thumb: still clearly tournament-legal → grade Light Played instead; clearly not tournament-legal → grade Poor instead; everything in between is Played
Poor
PO- Severe damage, possibly not tournament-legal or structurally sound
TierZero
The TierZero Grade, six in a row
Near Mint
NM- Front and back both essentially unmarked — no whitening on corners or edges under normal light
- Minor factory marks from printing/cutting are fine; any actual play or handling wear is not
- If you have to tilt it under a lamp to convince yourself something's there, it's still NM
Lightly Played
LP- Visible whitening/silvering along the edges and corners — this is the tier where wear first becomes obvious without needing raking light
- On this card, that silvering runs along the black border but doesn't extend into scratching across the printed surface
- The moment edge wear is joined by surface scratching, clouding, or any crease, it drops to Moderately Played
Excellent
EX- TierZero-only tier — no equivalent on the North American scale
- Noticeably heavier edge/corner silvering than Lightly Played, plus more scratching across the surface
- No crease — the moment a crease appears, the card drops to Moderately Played instead
Moderately Played
MP- This is the tier most likely to surprise someone — a card can look clean at a glance and still belong here
- On this card, the front and edges present almost NM, but the back carries a light crease that only becomes visible under flash or raking light, not flat room lighting
- We deliberately shoot MP-and-below listings under flash/raking light so buyers see the actual defect, not just what's visible under normal lighting
- Any crease, however light, is enough on its own to keep a card out of LP no matter how clean everything else looks
Heavily Played
HP- Multiple types of wear stacking on the same card — heavy edge/corner whitening, visible surface scratching, and at least one crease, not just one of these in isolation
- The card is still fully intact and easy to authenticate; it just shows the accumulated result of a lot of play without protection
- If a card has this much wear and is torn, split, or missing material, it's Damaged, not Heavily Played
Damaged
DMG- Any loss of the card's structure — a torn or missing corner, a split layer, a hole — is automatic Damaged, independent of everything else about the card
- On this card, most of the surface is otherwise unremarkable, but the missing corner chunk overrides that; we don't average condition across a card
- Damaged also covers alterations (signatures, inking, stamps) and foreign substances — no amount of clean surface elsewhere offsets a structural or authenticity issue
Cross-reference
The TierZero Grade mapping
How a North American grade, the TierZero grade and the nearest European grade line up — and what to actually expect in the package.
| North America | TierZero Grade | Nearest European grade(s) | What to expect |
|---|---|---|---|
| NMNear Mint | NM | M NM | Straightforward overlap. Fresh-from-pack condition on both sides. |
| HPHeavily Played | HP | LP PL | Heavy, visible wear throughout, but the card is still whole and authenticatable. |
| DMGDamaged | DMG | PO | Structural damage, alterations, or anything that fails on integrity rather than just cosmetics. |
Why TierZero has its own EX tier. This card is a good example of why. There's noticeably heavier edge and corner silvering than TierZero Lightly Played allows, plus more scratching across the surface — but no crease, so it's not Moderately Played either. Forcing it into either neighbour would be wrong one way or the other, so under TierZero Grade it's simply EX — its own tier, sitting between LP and MP.
Quick method
How to grade a card in under a minute
Work through these in order. Structure comes first because a crease overrides everything found later.
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Structure
Flex check for bends, creases, or splitting. Any structural damage caps the grade immediately — cosmetics stop mattering.
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Corners
Look for softening, whitening, or fraying at all four corners, front and back.
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Edges
Run along all four edges under angled light for whitening, chipping, or scuffing.
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Surface
Check for scratches, clouding, dirt, and — on foils — bubbling or curl. Tilt under light; don't just look straight on.
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Legitimacy
Confirm authentication markers are intact and check for alterations: ink, paint, stamps, or signatures.
Non-negotiable
Automatic downgrades — don't debate these
These faults set the grade on their own, regardless of how the rest of the card looks.
Alterations
Signatures, stamps, ink, or paint → Damaged (NA) / Poor (EU), no matter how clean the rest of the card is.
Foreign substances
Food, liquid, or other residue → not sellable in any condition, on either standard.
Border tampering
Blackened or whitened borders → Poor (EU) / Damaged (NA), treated as an attempt to disguise wear.
Manufacturing defects
Miscuts and shifting are graded separately from wear — note them, but don't confuse them with play condition.
Grading is a judgement call, not an exact science. When a card sits on a line between two grades, we grade down, not up.
Any question?
If we still haven't answered your question, you can contact us below and we will get back to you as soon as possible.