Bouldering grades explained: V scale vs Font scale

The colored tag under a problem is the first thing a new climber looks for. It is also the least standard thing in the hall. Two grading systems split the bouldering world, and every hall bends them to its own walls. The arguments never stop on r/bouldering (thread). Gym grades feel too easy to some climbers and sandbagged to others. The numbers stop meaning anything across the street. This guide decodes the tag. It covers what a grade measures, the two systems side by side, and why halls disagree. It ends with how to use the number well. New here? The Beginner Guides hub collects all of these posts.

What a bouldering grade actually grades

A bouldering grade rates the difficulty of one problem’s moves. It does not measure danger, effort, or how good a climber you are. Both major systems ignore risk entirely. They focus only on how hard the sequence of movements is. Wikipedia’s climbing-grade overview records this in its history of the systems. A grade also isn’t a measurement. The climber who first completes a problem proposes a grade. Everyone who repeats it either agrees or pushes back. The label settles where consensus lands.

The American V scale was first published in 1991. John “Verm” Sherman introduced it in his Hueco Tanks guidebook. Legend says his publisher wouldn’t print the book without ratings for its 900 routes. The scale is open-ended. It starts at V0, with a “VB” rung below it for beginners. Its hardest confirmed problem carried V17 as of May 2026.

The Font scale comes from Fontainebleau, the bouldering forest south of Paris. Its use there is traceable back to at least 1960. It runs from 1 upward and adds a plus sign between steps. From 6 it adds capital letters: 6A, 6B, 6C, and onward. Its hardest grade stood at 9A in 2026. That is the same climb the V scale calls V17. Japan adds a third system, the Dankyu scale, which borrows its shape from martial arts rankings.

V scale : The American system, short for “Vermin”, first published 1991. It runs V0, V1, V2 upward, with VB below it. It dominates North American halls.

Font scale : The European system from Fontainebleau, traceable to at least 1960. It runs 1 to 9 with plus signs, then A, B, C from 6. It dominates European halls.

VB : The “beginner” rung below V0 on the V scale. Some halls print it; others simply start at V0.

• and A/B/C suffixes : The half-steps. V2 to V2+ works like Font 5 to 5+. From 6, the Font scale splits into 6A, 6B, and 6C.

Dankyu : Japan’s system, built like martial arts ranks. It counts down from 10-kyu to 1-dan and beyond.

The two systems side by side

The V scale rules North American gyms. The Font scale rules Europe. From the middle grades upward they line up almost exactly, which is why conversion tables exist at all. Below that zone, the alignment loosens. Tables differ by a step or two, depending on who drew them.

The table below follows the comparison published on Wikipedia. That table credits a 2016 report by the Club Alpino Italiano for the international federation. It also credits guidebook publisher Rockfax and theCrag. Wikipedia adds a useful warning. The scales were built independently, so rows at the bottom are indicative only. Only after V9 / Font 7C do the systems exactly align.

Two traps hide in the notation. Font bouldering grades use capital letters, so 6C+ means bouldering. A lowercase f6c+ belongs to the French sport-climbing scale. That scale describes roped routes, and f6c+ is far easier than its capitalized twin. The second trap is trusting the table at the bottom. A gym V0 and a forest 4 share a row, but they don’t share a history. The next two sections explain why that row is the loosest in the table.

Why the same grade feels different in every hall

Each hall grades against its own walls, holds, and setters. A grade compares problems inside one hall, not across halls. The halls this site profiles make the point without any argument. Boulderwelt München West grades on its own nine-level scale, mapped to the Font system. Level 1 spans Fb 2a to 3b, and level 9 starts at Fb 7b+ (profile). Südbloc in Berlin sets everything in six grades plus a joker color (profile). Bright Site, also Berlin, grades by hold color and prints the number on a card below the climb (profile). Three halls, three ladders.

Climbers have turned this into a running joke and a serious complaint at once. “A v5 in a gym is different to a v5 on the board which is different to a v5 outside.”

That’s how one r/bouldering commenter summed up the problem (comment). The pattern stretches across regions too. A Germany-based climber notes that every German hall they’ve visited runs its own grading system. US halls, by contrast, more often use the Hueco scale (comment). Even the ceiling differs. When climbers compared their home gyms’ hardest grade, answers ranged from around V8 to V11 in one transatlantic thread (thread).

Setting cycles add more wobble. Problems get stripped and reset every few weeks. Each reset brings fresh grades from whoever set that week’s problems. A hall’s V4 in January and its V4 in March can come from different hands. Regulars feel this as a sudden jump or drop after a reset wall goes up.

Gym grades versus outdoor grades

Indoors, the bottom of the scale runs softer than the same numbers on rock. The gap narrows as grades climb. Climbers who move between gym and crag repeat this observation often. The low grades are “a wild, wild difference”, in one commenter’s words. The reason: outdoor problems never offer the friendly jug ladders gyms set for beginners (comment). Others put convergence around V9 or V10. There, gym problems stop being approachable and start assuming real strength (comment).

The history explains the mismatch. The V scale was invented by experienced outdoor boulderers recording problems for each other. Even an outdoor V0 assumed a baseline of skill. Indoor V0 was designed to do the opposite. It aimed to be something anyone can walk in and climb (comment). Rock adds its own taxes on top. Holds aren’t shaped for hands. Friction changes with the weather. Reading a line on grey stone is harder than following colored plastic. Climbers’ practical summary: don’t expect your gym number outside, especially in the bottom half of the scale.

How to use grades as a beginner

Treat grades as a ladder inside your own hall. The ladder exists to help you pick problems and watch yourself improve. It isn’t a score against strangers. Climbers’ own timelines show the middle grades slow down for nearly everyone. Plateaus around V4 to V6 are described as normal (comment). Two terms help early on. A flash means sending a problem on the first try, with no falls. A project is the problem you keep returning to until it goes.

A simple session shape works with the ladder rather than against it. Climb most of your problems a level or two below your limit. Save one or two limit tries for the end. By then the fingers are warm, and the attempts don’t matter much. Then watch the ladder over weeks, not days.

• Climb most of your session a level or two below your limit.
• Keep one or two limit problems for the end of the session.
• Track your sends inside one hall, where the ladder is consistent.
• Ignore grade comparisons with climbers at other halls.
• Treat outdoor grades as a different scale until you have rock miles.

Sources: Wikipedia’s Grade (climbing) article, fetched 7 September 2026, for system histories and the V/Font comparison table. That table credits the Club Alpino Italiano’s 2016 report, Rockfax, and theCrag. Hall grading facts come from the linked hall profiles on this site, which source the gyms’ own pages. Community observations are attributed to r/bouldering threads via the Arctic Shift archive, linked inline. They are opinion rather than fact.

Filed under Beginner Guides.