CSG Grading: Now CGC Cards, Legacy Grades and Fees

CSG grading, short for Certified Sports Guaranty, was the sports card grading service of Certified Collectibles Group, the same company group that owns CGC; today sports cards from that group are graded under the CGC Cards name, and CGC's own grading scale lists the old CSG grades as legacy grades. Wikipedia's history of NGC records that in 2006 CSG shared a building with its sister companies NGC (coins), PMG (paper money), CGC (comics) and others, and that Blackstone acquired the group in 2021.

CGC Cards describes itself as the CGC division that grades trading card games, sports cards and non-sports cards, backed by the same ownership and management as NGC, PMG and CGC. Its fee page still mentions CSG in one place: the ReHolder service moves "a card in a CGC or CSG holder" into a new CGC holder for $10. So older CSG slabs are still in circulation, and CGC will re-house them.

CGC's grading scale page has a legacy grade key. It says:

• CSG Gem Mint 9.5 now corresponds to CGC Cards Gem Mint 10.
• CGC Trading Cards Gem Mint 9.5 also corresponds to CGC Cards Gem Mint 10.
• CSG Perfect 10 and CGC Trading Cards Perfect 10 are retired grades that keep their Perfect 10 status.

This matters when you compare prices. A CSG 9.5 from before the change sits at the same level as today's CGC Gem Mint 10, not below it. The current scale has two top grades, Pristine 10 and Gem Mint 10; both are explained on our CGC card grading scale page.

Per-card fees on CGC's US fee page, read Sept. 25, 2026 (maximum card value and turnaround in working days):

• Bulk: $17, up to $500, 150 days; 25-card minimum, types can be mixed.
• Economy: $20, up to $1,000, 90 days.
• Standard: $55, up to $3,000, 10 days.
• Express: $100, up to $10,000, 5 days.
• WalkThrough: $300, up to $100,000, 2 days.
• Unlimited Value: $300 plus 1% of fair market value, 2 days.
• ReHolder (CGC or CSG slab into a new CGC holder): $10, 20 days.

The cheaper tiers have gone up this year: CGC's announcement of its Jan. 6, 2026 prices listed Bulk at $15 and Economy at $18.

• Size: in 2025 PSA graded 19.26 million cards (71.8% of the total) and CGC 4.92 million (18.4%), and CGC's volume grew 121% from 2024 (GemRate data, SI, Jan. 4, 2026). PSA grades are the ones most sale listings quote.
• Top grades: CGC has two 10s, Pristine 10 and Gem Mint 10. PSA's top grade is Gem Mint 10; see our PSA grading scale page.
• Price and speed: CGC's Standard tier is $55 for 10 working days on cards up to $3,000. PSA's cheapest open tier from Sept. 14, 2026 is Standard at $59.99 for 90–100 business days on cards up to $1,000; PSA's Value tiers are paused while its backlog is about 9.9 million cards (SI, Sept. 9, 2026).
• Resale: neither company publishes a conversion between its grades and the other's, and the same card in a PSA 10 and a CGC 10 can sell for different prices. Compare sold prices for the same card in each company's slab before choosing.

• Look up the certification number on the label with CGC's cert verification tool; CGC Cards lists it on its home page.
• Compare the label and grade with what the lookup returns, and read old CSG grades with the legacy key above.
• Inspect the holder: CGC says its holders have security features; a cracked, scuffed or reglued case is a reason to ask questions.
• Want a newer slab? Use the $10 ReHolder service rather than cracking the card out.

StarLens identifies the card inside the slab from a photo, so you can check that the card matches the label.

Research and drafting for this page were assisted by AI and checked line by line against the sources listed below. Every price names its source and the date we read it. A CGC collector forum thread and a Facebook group post in the top results could not be read automatically on Sept. 25, 2026, and we did not find a CGC page giving the exact date CSG grading moved under the CGC Cards name, so the page gives no date for it. Where that left a gap, the page says so instead of guessing. Prices change; treat them as a reference, not an offer. If you find an error, tell us and we will correct it.