CoinEvaluatorApp tests coin evaluator apps for collectors who want a clear yes or no on grading — not just a guess at what your coin is worth. We score apps on whether they tell you what to do next.
Who We Are
Two of us started this after inheriting a small collection of U.S. coins and realizing we had no idea whether to spend $50 on grading a coin that might only gain $20 in value, or $200 on a potentially higher-tier submission. We downloaded app after app and found that most gave us a price range but no framework for the actual decision: Is this coin a grading candidate, and will the grade bump justify the cost? That gap — between knowing a coin's estimated value and knowing what action to take — is what drives our reviews. We believe an evaluator app should answer the question 'what should I do with this coin?' first, and 'how much is it worth?' second.
Methodology
We test each coin evaluator app against 28 coins spanning key U.S. series: Lincoln wheat cents (1940s–1950s, circulated and uncirculated), Mercury dimes (MS-63 through MS-66 grades), Washington quarters (modern and vintage), Morgan dollars (both common and semi-key dates), and Kennedy half dollars. We run each app through a 6-week cycle, submitting the same coins at least twice to check for consistency. Our test investment is roughly 50 hours per app over that period — including photography, metadata entry, and independent price-range verification against current market data. We track how each estimate evolves, measure the spread width, and note whether the app surfaces grade sensitivity (i.e., does it show you the value delta between MS-64 and MS-65 for your specific coin?). After each major platform update, we re-test our core set to catch regressions.
Our Standards
We believe an evaluator app should tell you what to do next, not just what your coin is worth. A useful app shows you the spread across grades for your specific coin — not just a midpoint — and contextualizes that spread against grading costs. If your coin is estimated at $85 raw but could reach $120 if graded MS-65, and a PCGS Tier 3 submission costs $45 with a 15-day turnaround, the app should help you see the break-even. It should show you when grading is a rational choice and when it isn't. Apps that return a single decimal-precise number ($87.43) without grade scenarios or cost context don't pass our review. Neither do apps that ignore the real question: given this coin's estimated grade spread and current submission costs, what's my ROI if I grade? We also look for apps that handle grade uncertainty honestly — if the app thinks your coin could be anywhere from MS-62 to MS-65, it should say so, not force a false precision.
Disclosure
We do not accept paid placement or priority review from app developers; we do not test or recommend an app we have not used for at least two weeks with real coins of our own. We do not score apps on price precision alone — an app that predicts value within 2% but doesn't help you decide whether to grade is not useful by our standard. We do not test rare-coin specialties (ancient coins, world numismatics, or bullion) beyond our core U.S. series; our grading-ROI focus is strongest for modern and semi-modern U.S. coins where PCGS and NGC submission is a realistic choice for most collectors.
Contact
If you've built a coin evaluator app and would like us to review it, or if you have a coin series you think we should add to our test set, contact us via the form on this site. We review all requests and aim to respond within one week.