If you’ve spent any time in the Pokémon card community, you’ve probably heard people talk about centering. It comes up constantly at card shows, in grading discussions, and whenever someone pulls a card and immediately tilts it sideways to check the borders. But if you’re newer to collecting, it’s not always obvious what centering actually means, how to measure it, or when it actually matters for you.
This is our guide to all of it from a collector’s perspective rather than a grading manual.
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What is centering on a Pokémon card?
Centering refers to how evenly the printed image sits within the card’s borders. A perfectly centered card has equal border width on all four sides. An off-center card has one border noticeably thicker than the opposite one, either left vs right or top vs bottom.
It’s a print quality issue, not a damage issue. The card didn’t get handled badly, it just came out of the print run that way. Some sets and print runs are notorious for it, and there’s nothing you can do to fix it after the fact.
How centering is measured and expressed
Centering is expressed as a ratio like 55/45 or 60/40. The first number represents the percentage of border on one side, and the second number represents the percentage on the opposite side. A perfectly centered card would be 50/50, though that’s rare in practice.
This is measured separately for both axes:
- Left/Right (horizontal centering)
- Top/Bottom (vertical centering)
So a card might be well-centered left to right but noticeably off top to bottom. Both matter when it comes to grading.
To measure it yourself, you’ll need a ruler or digital caliper. Measure the border width on each side, add them together to get the total, then divide each individual measurement by the total and multiply by 100 to get the percentage.
Centering and grading: what the numbers actually mean
If you’re submitting cards to a grading service, centering is one of the four main criteria they assess alongside corners, edges, and surface. Here’s roughly what the ratios mean for PSA grades:
- PSA 10 (Gem Mint): 55/45 or better on the front, 75/25 or better on the back
- PSA 9 (Mint): 60/40 to 65/35 or better on the front, 90/10 or better on the back
- PSA 8: 70/30 or better on the front
Centering acts as a hard cap on your grade. A card with perfect corners, edges, and surface but centering outside the 55/45 threshold will cap out at PSA 9 regardless of everything else. This is why experienced submitters check centering first. If it fails the PSA 10 threshold, nothing else really matters for that submission level.
It’s also worth knowing that the back of the card has more lenient standards for PSA 10 but gets significantly stricter at PSA 9, where 90/10 is required. A card with great front centering but a badly off-center back can still cost you a grade.
Centering ratio examples: what each one actually looks like
Centering is measured on both axes independently, left/right and top/bottom, and both count equally toward your grade. A card can have perfect left/right centering and still miss PSA 10 because of a top/bottom issue, so it’s worth checking all four borders, not just the sides.
50/50
Perfectly centered on that axis. Equal border width on both sides (whether left and right, or top and bottom). Rare, but it happens!
55/45
Very slightly off. Borderline unnoticeable to the naked eye and right at the PSA 10 threshold. This is what you’re aiming for on any card you’re planning to submit.
60/40
Noticeable if you’re looking for it, but still within PSA 9 range. Most collectors would consider this a good raw card. Worth measuring carefully before submitting for PSA 10.
65/35
Visibly off. You can see it without measuring. This is PSA 8 or 9 territory depending on the card’s other attributes. Fine for a binder copy, but not for a high-grade submission.
70/30 and worse
Obviously off and noticeable even in a sleeve. This card won’t grade above PSA 8 and realistically will land lower. Price should reflect it significantly, and there’s actually a name for when it gets really bad.
What is Baka Centering?
Baka (馬鹿) is a Japanese word meaning “stupid” or “foolish,” and in the Pokémon card community it’s been adopted as shorthand for centering so bad it’s almost impressive. There’s no official threshold for what counts as Baka, it’s more of a gut reaction than a measurement, but you’ll generally hear it used for anything in the 80/20 range or worse, where the border on one side is so thin it’s basically nonexistent.
It shows up a lot in discussions about Japanese cards pulled straight from booster packs, where collectors will post photos of otherwise beautiful cards completely ruined by the print run (which is actually exactly what happened to us when we hit a God Pack). If you’ve ever seen a card where the artwork is practically falling off one edge, that’s Baka Centering.
For grading purposes it’s a non-starter. A card like this won’t crack PSA 8 on centering alone. For a binder copy it’s entirely your call, but it’ll be visible even in a sleeve and it tends to bother people more over time than they expect when they first buy it.
Why centering matters more on Pokémon cards than other TCGs
Pokémon cards tend to have narrower borders than some other trading card games, which means the same millimetre offset looks more dramatic. A card that would read as 55/45 on a wide bordered sports card might read as 60/40 or worse on a Pokémon card, just because there’s less total border to absorb the difference. It makes centering proportionally more impactful on Pokémon cards than on games with wider borders.
Which sets have the worst centering?
Centering consistency varies a lot by set and print run. Some general patterns the community has noticed:
- Japanese cards tend to have better centering than English cards overall, which is part of why Japanese collectors often prefer them for high-grade submissions.
- Sword & Shield era sets had a reputation for inconsistent centering on English cards, with some sets being particularly bad.
- Newer Scarlet & Violet sets have been more consistent in some areas but still vary by print run.
The honest answer is that centering is somewhat random within any given set. You can open multiple copies of the same card and get very different results. This is why collectors who are planning to submit cards for grading often buy multiple raw copies and cherry-pick the best centered one before submitting.
How to check centering when buying a card
At a card show or in a store
Hold the card at arm’s length and look straight on. Tilt it slightly to catch the light, as this can make border width differences easier to see. Don’t rely on your eye alone for anything you’re planning to grade — use an app, ruler or caliper to actually measure (more on that below).
Also worth knowing: even among slabbed cards with the same PSA grade, centering can look noticeably different from one copy to another. A PSA 10 centering standard allows up to 60/40, which means some PSA 10s look more centered than others. If centering matters to you aesthetically, inspect the actual card inside the slab rather than just buying the grade.
For more tips on what to look for at a card show, check out our post here!
Tools for checking centering
- Ruler or digital caliper: The most accurate method. Measure the borders directly on the card.
- PriceCharting: Primarily known for pricing data but also has a handy centering calculator built in.
- Edge Grading: A free web tool for checking centering without needing to download anything.
- Card Centering Calculator: A dedicated app for measuring centering quickly. Available on iOS and Android.
- Grading Calculator for Pokémon: Helps you estimate likely grades based on your card’s condition, including centering. Available on iOS.
- Various physical centering tools are also available online and at card shows — small overlays or rulers designed specifically for measuring card borders consistently.
When buying online
Ask the seller for a straight-on photo of both the front and the back, ideally with the card lying flat rather than held at an angle. Photos taken at an angle can make centering look better or worse than it actually is. If you’re buying for grading purposes, ask for measurements.
When centering actually matters and when it doesn’t
This is where a lot of newer collectors get confused. Centering matters a lot in some contexts and almost not at all in others.
If you’re collecting for grading, centering is critical. It’s the first thing to check and can make or break a submission.
If you’re collecting for a binder, centering matters much less. A slightly off-center card looks completely fine in a sleeve on a binder page, and paying a premium for a well-centered copy of a card you’re just going to display is usually not worth it.
If you’re buying singles at a card show, watch out for the “priced to grade” markup. Some vendors will charge significantly more for a card on the basis that it has good centering and could get a high PSA grade. If you’re buying for your binder and not planning to submit, that premium means nothing to you. It’s completely fine to ask what the card would go for raw and ungraded, and to walk away if the pricing doesn’t make sense for what you need.
Should you pass on an off-center card?
It depends on what you’re buying it for.
If you’re buying for grading, pass or negotiate the price down to reflect the lower likely grade. An off-center card that can’t hit PSA 10 is worth meaningfully less to someone who’s planning to submit it.
If you’re buying for your binder, it depends on how off-center it actually is. Mild centering issues are barely noticeable in a sleeve. Severe off-centering, think 70/30 or worse, will be visible even in a binder and might bother you over time. Use your own eye and decide whether you can live with it at the price being asked.
The community rule of thumb is: don’t pay PSA 10 prices for a card with PSA 9 centering. Whatever you’re buying it for, the centering should be reflected in the price.
The bottom line
Centering is one of those things that feels technical until you’ve looked at a few cards side by side, and then it becomes second nature pretty quickly. The key things to take away: centering is a print quality issue, not a damage issue. It’s expressed as a ratio and measured on both horizontal and vertical axes. For grading it’s critical and caps your grade. For binder collecting it matters much less. Always let the centering be reflected in the price you pay, and never pay a grading premium for a card you’re not planning to grade.
Now that you know what to look for, centering will be one of the first things you check every time you pick up a card! Have any centering questions or tips we didn’t cover? Let us know in the comments below!
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