What is a GPA?
Your grade point average (GPA) compresses a whole term of letter grades into a single number. Each grade is first converted to grade points on the 4.0 scale — an A is worth 4.0, a B is 3.0, and so on — and then averaged. But it is not a plain average: every course is weighted by its credits, so a 4-credit course moves your GPA twice as much as a 2-credit course. That weighting is why one difficult high-credit class can lift (or sink) a semester far more than an easy elective.
This calculator works out your term GPA from up to eight courses, and if you enter your previous cumulative GPA and credits, it also shows your new cumulative GPA — the running average across your whole program, which is the number that appears on transcripts and scholarship decisions.
The GPA formula
Multiply each course's grade points by its credits to get its quality points, add the quality points of all courses, and divide by the total credits. The same formula produces a cumulative GPA if you first convert your previous record into quality points (previous GPA × previous credits) and add the new term on top — which is exactly what the optional fields above do.
The 4.0 scale used here — read this first
- A and A+ both count as 4.0. On the standard scale used by this calculator, 4.0 is the ceiling, so a plus on an A adds nothing.
- Plus and minus grades step by 0.3 (A- = 3.7, B+ = 3.3), except at the top, where A+ is capped at 4.0.
- Some schools differ. A few colleges award 4.3 for an A+, some high schools weight honors and AP courses up to 5.0, and some schools do not use plus/minus at all. If your school uses one of those systems, your official GPA will differ from the figure here — check your student handbook for its exact table. The full scale this calculator uses is printed in the breakdown section below so you can compare it directly.
- An F earns 0 points but its credits still count in the denominator, which is why a single F is so costly.
Term GPA vs cumulative GPA
Your term GPA describes one semester only. Your cumulative GPA blends every term, weighted by credits, so it moves more slowly as you accumulate credits: a student with 90 credits behind them will see a single strong semester shift the cumulative figure by only a few hundredths. That is also good news — one bad term early, when few credits are banked, is very recoverable.
Worked example
You take four courses: an A (4.0) in a 4-credit course, a B (3.0) in a 3-credit course, an A- (3.7) in a 3-credit course and a B+ (3.3) in a 2-credit course. Quality points are 16 + 9 + 11.1 + 6.6 = 42.7, over 12 credits, so your term GPA is 42.7 ÷ 12 = 3.56. Notice the A in the 4-credit course contributed more than the two smaller courses combined — credits are leverage.
How to use this calculator
- For each course, choose your letter grade from the dropdown — the grade points are filled in for you.
- Enter each course's credits. Leave courses you are not taking at 0 credits; they are ignored.
- Optionally enter your previous cumulative GPA and the credits behind it to see your new cumulative GPA.
- Read your term GPA in the green panel and check the per-course table to see which courses carry the most weight.
- Compare your school's scale with the reference table below if your institution weights grades differently.
How to raise a GPA efficiently
Because credits are the multiplier, effort is best spent where the credits are. Retaking a failed or very low course — where your school replaces the grade — is usually the single fastest GPA repair, because it swaps a near-zero quality-point contribution for a full one on the same credits. After that, protect the high-credit core courses: an A instead of a B in a 4-credit course adds 4 quality points, the same as acing two 2-credit electives. Finally, use the CGPA Calculator to see how a target term GPA would move your cumulative average before the semester starts, and the Grade Calculator to find the exact final-exam score a target course grade requires.