Magic Card Grading Guide with Examples

MintNear MintFineGood
MTG-HighFlyer Card Grading Guide
A - Mint (MT)
A card in this condition is not easy to find. Often near mint cards are mistakenly called mint. A mint card has no visible defects of any kind. This includes printed defects, including proper picture alignment.
B - Near Mint (NM)
A card in this condition is similar to a mint card except there may be one or two minor flaws such as a small edge ding only noticeable when inspected very closely. The flaws can not take away from the general appearance of the card. This condition represents how most cards appear from a newly opened pack.
C - Fine (FN)
In this condition a card will show some wear around the edges from play or have several small dings. The edges may also have a small amount of grayness from handling. The general appearance is diminished only a little from the slight wear. This is normally the lowest grade a collector will accept for his/her collection and then only until one in better condition is acquired.
D - Good (GD)
A card in this condition is best for players. Cards in this grade are usually used to trade to other players to play with. A card in this condition will have many defects, including printing errors, ink smears, scratches and slight swelling. The corners may have slight bends and the edges show definite wear.
More Grades
You may also encounter middle grades, such as Very Fine, Very Good, Near Mint/Mint, etc. These are used when a card might technically fit into one grade, but not really have enough of the qualities required to put it firmly into that category. A well-known and respected independent third party grader/authenticator Professional Sports Authenticator, PSA, uses a scale from 1 to 10, 1 being Poor, and 10 being Gem Mint. We feel that okay is the wrong forum for making such technical grading decisions. It would generate too much confusion between buyers and sellers, unless of course, the card had been graded by a third party like PSA and was sealed in the tamper-evident containers that they use. MTG-HighFlyer will never carry a card with a Poor grade. Fine and Good are grades that we rarely carry.
If you buy or might buy a card that is PSA graded you can go to their website and verify the card and its grade. Go to psacard.ge/verify.chtml and enter the number from the container that you see in the okay picture to obtain PSA's verification. The website should display the Card Name and the Grade given by PSA. Remember to verify that the card bought on okay is the one you received too.