- Joined
- Jan 8, 2020
- Messages
- 85
Last week I shared the results of AGS’s return to grading lab diamonds, as part of our involvement with the AGS lab diamond pilot program.
We are also one of the first to receive full-fidelity GIA grading reports, with 17 diamonds sent to GIA for secondary grading.
The results? Unsurprising! The majority of diamonds received the same grade from GIA as it did from IGI or GCAL. In cases where the labs differed, the grades were off by one color or clarity grade, and GIA was more liberal on the grade 6 times and harsher only once.
Note to the mods: this is not a sales post. This is to highlight a set of MMDs graded by two different labs, a unique opportunity to directly compare the 'harshness' vs 'looseness' of grading institutions to challenge widely held assumptions.
*Note: GIA does not provide an “ideal” designation for round diamonds
You may have read on this forum, blogs, or random places on the Internet that IGI will be at least two grades more liberal than GIA. You might have heard “if you buy an F VS1 from IGI, then that’s actually an H SI1 from GIA.” But our (admittedly still limited) data proves that ‘conventional wisdom’ wrong. How could that be?
Are there exceptions? Of course. we’ve seen hundreds of lab diamonds that got what I would consider an inaccurate or unfair grade. Will GIA make mistakes too? Yes. Diamond grading is subjective and human error is not 100% preventable.
If you are considering a lab diamond with an IGI or GCAL grade and you want a secondary grade by GIA, it is available to you with a 6-10 business day lead time. As we get closer to the holidays, I would imagine the lead times increasing.
If you’re shopping online, you likely won’t see a lot of GIA graded stones on eCommerce web sites as many of the wholesalers are taking a wait and see approach to assess demand for GIA by consumers. Also, AGS and GIA grading reports are far more expensive than IGI and GCAL reports, so the wholesalers that focus on supplying budget eCommerce sites will likely stay with the cheaper reports.
Thus, the prevalence of GIA and AGS graded lab diamonds may take many months to appear online. But if you demand a GIA cert, it is now available to you!
In full disclosure, I've lobbied aggressively for GIA to change its censorship of lab diamond grades for years, as we believe that more transparency is best for the consumer. We applaud GIA for finally making the decision to release uncensored grading reports of lab diamonds.
If you’ve received any secondary grades of lab diamonds, please DM me the results (or post them here if you prefer). I’d love to see if your results are inline with ours!
We are also one of the first to receive full-fidelity GIA grading reports, with 17 diamonds sent to GIA for secondary grading.
The results? Unsurprising! The majority of diamonds received the same grade from GIA as it did from IGI or GCAL. In cases where the labs differed, the grades were off by one color or clarity grade, and GIA was more liberal on the grade 6 times and harsher only once.
Note to the mods: this is not a sales post. This is to highlight a set of MMDs graded by two different labs, a unique opportunity to directly compare the 'harshness' vs 'looseness' of grading institutions to challenge widely held assumptions.
You may have read on this forum, blogs, or random places on the Internet that IGI will be at least two grades more liberal than GIA. You might have heard “if you buy an F VS1 from IGI, then that’s actually an H SI1 from GIA.” But our (admittedly still limited) data proves that ‘conventional wisdom’ wrong. How could that be?
- Diamond grading is just not that complicated, especially when grading higher quality diamonds. Side-by-side, a D VS1 is easy to spot over a F SI1, even to an untrained eye. It shouldn’t surprise anyone that GIA gave similar grades as IGI for the D-G color, VS+ goods we submitted.
- The COVID-related disruption in diamond mining and polishing of diamonds has cost GIA millions of dollars in grading fees, as there aren’t newly cut natural diamonds to grade. GIA’s change to lab diamond grading policies will bring them millions of dollars in grading fees, if their grades are in line with the grades of AGS, GCAL, and IGI. So GIA has little incentive to rock the boat.
- We didn’t send GIA trash diamonds. We only buy the lab diamonds that pass our rigorous QC standards, and we only sent GIA diamonds that we own. This is obviously a hand-curated subset of the overall lab diamond market.
- IGI gets a bad reputation because the natural market has only used them to grade the dregs for years. None of the best producers of natural diamonds are sending their D VVS goods to IGI. So garbage in, garbage out when it comes to mined diamonds.
Are there exceptions? Of course. we’ve seen hundreds of lab diamonds that got what I would consider an inaccurate or unfair grade. Will GIA make mistakes too? Yes. Diamond grading is subjective and human error is not 100% preventable.
If you are considering a lab diamond with an IGI or GCAL grade and you want a secondary grade by GIA, it is available to you with a 6-10 business day lead time. As we get closer to the holidays, I would imagine the lead times increasing.
If you’re shopping online, you likely won’t see a lot of GIA graded stones on eCommerce web sites as many of the wholesalers are taking a wait and see approach to assess demand for GIA by consumers. Also, AGS and GIA grading reports are far more expensive than IGI and GCAL reports, so the wholesalers that focus on supplying budget eCommerce sites will likely stay with the cheaper reports.
Thus, the prevalence of GIA and AGS graded lab diamonds may take many months to appear online. But if you demand a GIA cert, it is now available to you!
In full disclosure, I've lobbied aggressively for GIA to change its censorship of lab diamond grades for years, as we believe that more transparency is best for the consumer. We applaud GIA for finally making the decision to release uncensored grading reports of lab diamonds.
If you’ve received any secondary grades of lab diamonds, please DM me the results (or post them here if you prefer). I’d love to see if your results are inline with ours!
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