GPA Calculator (4.0 Scale)
Courses with credits and grades — letter or percent — become a weighted 4.0-scale GPA, with per-course breakdown and cumulative GPA. Nothing you type leaves your browser.
Also available as a desktop app for Windows.
About this tool
A GPA is a weighted average, and the weighting is the part people get wrong. Each course contributes its grade points multiplied by its credits, and the total is divided by total credits — so a 4-credit course moves your GPA three times as much as a 1-credit elective. The term GPA in the example above (A−, B+, B, A over 12 credits) works out to 3.48: quality points 41.7, spread over 12 credits.
The letter table is the standard 4.0 scale — A+ and A both count 4.0, each step down subtracts 0.3, and F counts 0. If your school gives A+ a bonus (4.3 is a common variant) or lacks D−, the honest fix is one row in the grade table, not a hidden switch: the scale lives in one place precisely so it can be checked and changed in the open. Percentages are folded onto letters using the common ten-point scale, and the per-course table always shows which letter each percentage became, so a boundary case like 92.9 → A− is visible rather than buried.
Cumulative GPA is where direct averaging breaks. Mixing a 3.0 over 30 earned credits with a 4.0 term over 3 credits gives 102 ÷ 33 ≈ 3.09 — weighting by credits is the only correct fold, and averaging 3.0 and 4.0 to get 3.5 overstates it badly. The same weighting runs backwards in the target section: given how many credits remain, it solves for the average grade points those credits must carry, and tells you plainly when even straight A grades cannot reach the target.
Frequently asked questions
- Why do A+ and A both count 4.0?
- That is the College Board standard 4.0 scale, and it is the most widely used version. Some institutions award A+ a 4.3 or 4.33 bonus; this tool does not guess that variant — the scale lives in one visible table, so a school-specific tweak is a one-line change rather than a hidden option.
- How are percentages converted to letters?
- On the common ten-point scale: 97+ = A+, 93+ = A, 90+ = A−, then 87/83/80 for B+, B, B−, 77/73/70 for C+, C, C−, 67/63/60 for D+, D, D−, and anything below 60 is F. Boundaries are inclusive from above — a 90.0 counts as A−. The per-course table shows the letter each percentage landed on so boundary cases are checkable.
- Is this a weighted GPA (AP/Honors boost) calculator?
- No. Weighted scales add points for AP/IB/Honors courses, but the bonus differs by school (commonly +0.5 or +1.0), so any fixed number would be wrong somewhere. This calculator computes unweighted GPA on the standard 4.0 scale; if your transcript already lists weighted grade points, the math here still works — enter the grades as they are weighted.
- Why is my cumulative GPA not the average of my term GPAs?
- Because terms carry different credit loads. The correct fold weights each term by its credits: GPA × credits summed, divided by total credits. A 3.0 over 30 credits plus a 4.0 over 3 credits gives about 3.09, not 3.5 — the term-GPA average would need the light 3-credit term to count as much as the 30-credit one, which it does not.
- What are quality points?
- Grade points multiplied by credits, per course, and their total. Quality points are the raw material of every GPA calculation: the term GPA is total quality points divided by total credits, and the cumulative GPA folds your prior quality points in the same way. Seeing them per course makes it obvious which course is pulling the average down.
- Does it send my grades anywhere?
- No. Every calculation is plain arithmetic in the page. There is no server, no request and no logging, and the tool keeps working with the network switched off — a practical way to verify the claim yourself.