Meaning of grade In English

• 0 a level of quality, size, importance, etc.:

  • He's suffering from some kind of low-grade (= slight) infection, which he can't seem to get rid of.

  • There's some really high-grade (= high quality) musicianship on this recording.

  • Bill has been on the same grade (= his job has been of the same level of importance, or he has had the same level of pay) for several years now.

  • Steve never studies, but he always gets good grades.

  • UK Carla got a grade A in German.

• 1 a school class or group of classes in which all the children are of a similar age or ability:

  • Jackie is in the sixth grade.

• 2 a gradient :

  • The next hill has a really steep grade.

• 3 to separate people or things into different levels of quality, size, importance, etc.:

  • The fruit is washed and then graded by size.

  • The books are graded according to the difficulty of the language.

  • to grade work/papers

• 4 a measure of the quality of a student’s performance, usually represented by the letters A (the best) through F (the worst):

  • She always gets good grades.

  • high-grade musicianship

  • He’s suffering from a low-grade infection.

• 5 a school class or group of classes in which all the children are of a similar age or ability:

  • James is in the seventh grade this year.

• 6 the degree of slope of land or of a road or path:

  • In hilly San Francisco, many streets have a steep grade.

• 7 to judge and give a mark to a student, exam, etc.:

  • The essays were graded on clarity of expression.

  • Eggs are usually graded by size.

• 8 a letter or combination of letters used by ratings agencies to show how certain they are that a loan will be paid back by the person or organization that borrowed the money:

  • Bonds which are rated A are considered as upper-medium grade obligations.

• 9 one of the levels of quality given to a particular product or substance :

  • March futures on commercial grade coffee closed at $1.04 per pound Friday.

  • high/low grade Technicians carefully loaded new fuel rods of high grade uranium into the cooling water.

  • aircraft/human/weapons, etc. grade The scooters are made from aircraft grade aluminium alloy and weigh just 2.76kg.

• 10 a level or division within an organization or system:

  • The administrative grade, recruited from top-quality university graduates, prepares policy advice for ministers.

  • a pay/salary grade

• 11 to be as good as expected or as good as is necessary:

  • Many of the online shops simply failed to make the grade.

• 12 to judge the quality of a product, substance, or organization, or the performance of an employee:

  • The fibre is graded and packed into bales for transport to factories for spinning, dying, and milling.

  • be graded on sth He said that principals and superintendents would be graded on leadership and school performance.

  • be graded for sth Inside the world's largest covered building, the flowers are graded for quality and catalogued by computer.