How does the 4.0 GPA scale work?

Applying to College
1

Hi!
My school doesn’t calculate our GPA on the 4.0 scale. I’m not sure what my GPA would be unweighted/weighted.
Can someone help me with this? You don’t have to calculate my GPA but can you guide me through the steps (for both unweighted and weighted)? Thank you so much :).

2

There are a lot of ways to calculated unweighted GPAs on a 4.0 scale, but here is one method that will give the idea.

Take each individual letter grade and assign it one of 0, 1, 2, 3, or 4 “grade points” according to the following scale:

A = 4 points
B = 3 points
C = 2 points
D = 1 points
F = 0 points

(You can make this more complicated by adding plus/minus grades.)

This assumes every class you’ve taken is worth one credit. For half-credit classes, divide the number of points by two.

Now:

  1. Add up all the grade points.
  2. Divide this number by the number of credits attempted. If you’ve never failed a class, this is the same as the number of credits you’ve earned. If every class is worth one credit, this is the same as the number of classes you’ve taken throughout your high school career. This is your unweighted GPA.

Weighted GPAs are even more variable. Often they are on 5.0 or 6.0 scales. One possible (5.0) scale is the following:

5 points = A in AP/honors class
4 points = A in regular class, B in AP/honors class
3 points = B in regular class, C in AP/honors class
2 points = C in regular class, D in AP/honors class
1 point = D in regular class
0 points = F in any class

You should not self-report the GPAs you calculate using these methods; it’s just to give you an idea of what kind of GPA you might have if your school used a 4.0 scale. When you apply to colleges, you can just give your GPA/grades as reported by your school.

3

@halcyonheather is everything 93 or above an A? Would a 93 still be a 4? My lowest grade is a 92, would I count that as a 3, or is there another value for a B+? Are IB HL classes weighted the same as AP? How about IB SL? Thank you so much :).

4

Depends on the HS

To both questions, in general yes, but it depends on the HS.

Having said that, go back and read @halcyonheather 's final paragraph.

If your HS does not report GPA’s, you don’t recalculate GPA’s for college admissions except, as an example, for UC’s. In that case, then will tell you how to calculate the GPA