Skip to content
GPA CollegeCalculator

How to calculate GPA

The formula, a worked example, and the rules for the cases that trip people up: failed courses, retakes, withdrawals and pass/fail.

Use the calculator instead

How to calculate GPA in five steps

  1. Convert each grade to points

    Look up each letter grade on the 4.0 scale. An A is 4.0, a B+ is 3.3, a B is 3.0, and so on down to 0.0 for an F.

  2. Multiply by credit hours

    Multiply each grade point value by the number of credit hours that course carried. The result is that course’s quality points.

  3. Add up the quality points

    Total the quality points from every graded course. Skip withdrawals, pass/fail passes and incompletes entirely.

  4. Add up the graded credit hours

    Total the credit hours from the same set of courses. Include failed courses, because an F carries credit hours even though it earns no points.

  5. Divide

    Divide total quality points by total graded credit hours. That result, rounded to two decimal places, is your GPA.

A worked example
CourseCreditsGradePointsQuality points
Microeconomics3A4.012.0
Statistics4B+3.313.2
Spanish II3B3.09.0
Chemistry lab1A-3.73.7
Total1137.9

37.9 quality points divided by 11 credits gives a 3.45 GPA.

GPA for common grade mixes
GradesClassesGPA
5 As54.00
4 As, 1 B53.80
3 As, 2 Bs53.60
2 As, 3 Bs53.40
1 A, 4 Bs53.20
4 As, 1 C53.60
3 As, 1 B, 1 C53.40
5 As, 1 B63.83
4 As, 2 Bs63.67
3 As, 3 Bs63.50
2 As, 4 Bs63.33
4 As, 1 B, 1 C63.50
6 As, 1 B73.86
5 As, 2 Bs73.71
4 As, 3 Bs73.57

Assumes every class has the same credits and no plus or minus grades. If your classes carry different credits, use the calculator instead.

Letter grade to 4.0 grade points
GradePointsPercentage
A+4.097-100
A4.093-96
A-3.790-92
B+3.387-89
B3.083-86
B-2.780-82
C+2.377-79
C2.073-76
C-1.770-72
D+1.367-69
D1.063-66
D-0.760-62
F0.0Below 60

What changes a GPA calculation?

A failed course is worse than it looks

An F earns zero quality points, but its credit hours stay in the denominator. A student with a 3.5 across 30 credits who fails a four-credit course drops to 3.09, because 105 quality points now divide by 34 credits instead of 30. That is a 0.41 fall from a single course.

Withdrawals are free, up to a point

A W leaves your GPA untouched. It is not free in every sense, though. Federal financial aid rules require schools to set a minimum completion rate for attempted credits, and two thirds (67 percent) is a common standard. Repeated withdrawals can put that at risk while your GPA still looks healthy.

Retakes depend entirely on policy

Grade replacement is the strongest repair tool, because it removes the bad quality points rather than diluting them. Grade averaging is far weaker, since the original attempt stays in the calculation. Find out which one your school uses before planning around it, and remember that graduate application services often recalculate using every attempt.

Pass/fail hides information both ways

A pass earns credit without grade points, so it cannot lift your GPA. That protects you in a hard course and denies you an easy 4.0 in a soft one. At some schools a failure in a pass/fail course still counts as an F, so the downside is not always symmetrical.

Checking your work

Two quick sanity checks. Your GPA can never be higher than your best grade or lower than your worst, so a result outside that range means an arithmetic error. And your GPA should sit closer to the grades in your high-credit courses than your low-credit ones.

Once the method makes sense, the college GPA calculator does the arithmetic for you, and the target GPA calculator runs it in reverse to tell you what you need next term.

Common questions

What is the GPA formula?
GPA equals total quality points divided by total graded credit hours, where a course’s quality points are its grade point value multiplied by its credit hours. Written out: GPA = sum of (grade points × credits) ÷ sum of credits.
Do failed courses count in the calculation?
Yes, and this is what makes them so damaging. An F contributes zero quality points but its credit hours still count in the denominator. A failed four-credit course adds four credits of weight while adding nothing to the top of the fraction, which is why one F pulls an average down so sharply.
How does retaking a course affect my GPA?
It depends on the school’s policy. Grade replacement removes the original attempt from the calculation so only the retake counts, which is the most effective single way to repair a GPA. Grade averaging counts both attempts. Some schools keep both on the transcript but count only the higher one. Graduate admissions services frequently count every attempt regardless.
Do withdrawals hurt my GPA?
No. A W carries no grade points and no credit hours, so it sits outside the calculation entirely. It can still affect financial aid, because aid programs look at the proportion of attempted credits you complete as well as your GPA.
How do I calculate GPA with different credit hours?
That is exactly what the credit weighting handles. Multiply each grade by its own credit hours before adding anything together. A four-credit A and a one-credit C are not equal contributors, and the formula accounts for that automatically.
Should I round my GPA?
Report it to two decimal places, as your transcript does, and never round up. A 3.48 is not a 3.5, and inflating it on an application is the kind of discrepancy that surfaces when a transcript is verified.

Other GPA calculators