A Complete Guide: Australian Grading System Explained

It is quite obvious that the grading system varies from one country to the other. It can be quite challenging for overseas students to understand the Australian grading system, especially when they are new here.  We have seen overseas students getting upset about the “D” grade in the Universities and TAFEs, so we created this nifty guide about Australian grading system at various education levels.

Please note that each and every state, university or institute may have different percentages and grade names. You may need to check with your university or institute about the grading system they use.

Universities Grading System in Australia

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First, let’s have a look at the university grading system. Although most universities will have similar grading scales which includes grades given below, some universities may have different percentage scales.

The grading scale given below is for undergraduate (Bachelor Degree Programs) and postgraduate programs (Master Degrees Programs).

Grades	Grade Description	Grade Scale (%)	GPA	UK Equivalent	US Equivalent
HD	High Distinction	85 – 100	7.00	First Class	A+
D	Distinction	75 – 84	6.00 – 6.99	Second Class – Upper Division	A
C	Credit	65 – 74	5.00 – 5.99	Second Class – Lower Division	B
P	Pass	50 – 64	4.00 – 4.99	Third Class	C
F	Fail	0 – 49	0.00 – 3.99	Fail	F

If you are planning to study a Degree with Honours, your grades will look different than the usual undergraduate and postgraduate grades. Honours Degree is usually an additional year of study after completing an undergraduate degree.

It usually requires a student to complete independent but supervised research in their field of study after completing the third year of a Bachelor’s degree.

Grades	Grade Description	Grade Scale (%)
H1	First Class Honours	80 – 100
H2A	Second Class Honours (Division A)	75 – 79
H2B	Second Class Honours (Division B)	70 – 74
H3	Third Class Honours	65 – 69
P	Pass	50 – 64
N	Fail	0 – 49

You can also search for various universities, TAFEs and private colleges on our search engine.

GPA and ATAR

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Unlike the USA, GPA’s (Grade Point Average) are not often used in the Australian grading system. Most commonly they are used in Medicine or Law stream courses.  For those who don’t know, GPA is a numerical calculation that helps to evaluate students academic performance in each study period or over the whole course.

It is calculated using the following formula:

GPA = Sum of ( Grade Point × Credit Points ) ÷ Sum of ( Credit Points )

While GPA is not a very popular method of grading in Australia, ATAR (Australian Tertiary Admission Ranks) score is one of the key scale used in measuring the student’s performance in Australia. Students who exceed certain ATAR threshold are eligible for government-sponsored opportunities and positions.

Universities in Australia using GPA usually have either 7 points GPA scale or 4 points GPA scale. The following table explain about the GPA scale system in Australia:

Grade Scale (%)	7-point GPA Scale	4-point GPA Scale	UK Equivalent	US Equivalent
85 – 100	7	4	First Class	A+
75 – 84	6 – 6.99	3	Second Class – Upper Division	A
65 – 74	5 – 5.99	2	Second Class – Lower Division	B
50 – 64	4 – 4.99	1	Third Class	C
0 – 49	0 – 3.99	0	Fail	F

Now let’s look at each and every state and territories grading system in Australia.

Australian Capital Territory Grading System

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The educations institution in the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) uses the following grading system:

Grade	Grade Description	Grade scale %
A	Extremely High Standard of Achievement	100 – 85
B	High Standard of Achievement	84 – 70
C	Acceptable Standard of Achievement	69 – 50
D	Limited Standard of Achievement	49 – 25
E	Very Limited Performance	0 – 24

New South Wales Grading System

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The table below shows the grading system used by the educational institutions in New South Wales:

Grade	Grade Description	Grade scale %
A	High Distinction	100 – 85
B	Distinction	84 – 70
C	Credit	69 – 50
D	Pass	49 – 25
E	Fail	0 – 24

Northern Territory Grading System

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Northern Territory institutions use the following grading system :

Grade	Scale 1	Scale 2
A	5	17 – 20
B	4 – 4.99	14 – 16.99
C	3 – 3.99	11 – 13.99
D	2 – 2.99	8 – 10.99
E	1 – 1.99	0 – 7.99

Queensland Grading System

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The table underneath explains the grading system adopted by the educational institution in Queensland:

Grade	Grade Description	Grade scale %
HD	High Distinction	7
D	Distinction	6 – 6.99
C	Credit	5 – 5.99
P	Pass	4 – 4.99
F	Fail	1 – 3.99

South Australia Grading System

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The institution in South Australia uses the following grading system:

Grade	Grade Description	Grade Scale %
HD	High Distinction	85 -100
D	Distinction	75 – 84
C	Credit	65- 74
P1	Pass Level 1	55 – 64
P2	Pass Level 2	50 – 54
F1	Fail Level 1	40 – 49
F2	Fail Level 2	30 – 39

Tasmania Grading System

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Tasmanian institutions had adopted the following grading scale since 2003:

Grade	Grade Description	Grade scale %
EA	Excellent Achievement	4.00
HA	High Achievement	3.50 – 3.99
CA	Commendable Achievement	3.00 – 3.49
SA	Satisfactory Achievement	2.50 – 2.99
PA	Preliminary Performance	2.00 – 2.49

Victorian Grading System

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The educational institutions in Victora use the following grading system:

Grade	Grade Description
A
B
C
D
E	Lowest grade needed to pass
F	Fail

Western Australia Grading System

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The table below explains the grading system adopted in Western Australia:

Grade	Grade Description	Grade Scale (%)
HD	High Definition	80 to 100
A	Excellent Achievement	80 to 100
B	High Achievement	70 to 79
C	Sound Achievement	60 to 69
D	Limited Achievement (lowest grade needed to pass)	50 to 59
E	Fail	0 to 49

Vocational Education and Training Grading System in Australia

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The vocational education system in Australia does not have university-style grades but rather based on the concept that you can either complete the task or not. So those students who are planning to undertake qualifications like Certificates (I to IV), Diploma and Advanced Diploma may get different grades in their certificates than at the university levels.

If the institute decides to use the grading system, it might use the same scales as university undergraduate scales (given above). But since vocational education is based on competency levels rather than grades, most of the vocational education provider will use grades like these:

Grades	Grade Description	Grade Scale (%)
C / S	Competent (Pass) / Satisfactory	100%
NYC / NS	Not Yet Competent (Fail) / Not Satisfactory	0%

Primary, Secondary and Senior Secondary Grading System in Australia

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In Australia, every state and territory has their own grading scales, so it is extremely important to understand that grades may look different than the one given below in the table.  As an overseas student, you can study in Australia after the age of 6.

Usually, the result reports of the students are given to the parents at least 2 times a year using the grading scale between A to F. Overseas students who are planning to study at Primary and Secondary level education in Australia, your grades may look something like:

Grades	Grade Description	Grade Scale (%)
A	Excellent	85 – 100
B	Good	70 – 84
C	Satisfactory	51 – 69
D	Limited	31 – 50
E	Very Low	26 – 30
F	Fail	0 – 25

If you would like to watch a quick summary of this guide in our video, you can watch it here:

If you like this video, then you might also like to watch our comparison between Universities, TAFEs, and Colleges.

FAQs regarding the Australian grading system

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