Work out your semester or overall GPA on the standard 4.0 scale by entering each course's letter grade and credit hours.
Your GPA isn't a simple average of your letter grades — it's a credit-weighted average, which means a 4-credit course counts twice as much toward your GPA as a 2-credit course. Each letter grade is first converted into a point value on a 4.0 scale, then multiplied by that course's credit hours to get its "quality points." Adding up quality points across every course and dividing by the total number of credit hours gives your GPA.
| Grade | Points | Grade | Points |
|---|---|---|---|
| A / A+ | 4.0 | C | 2.0 |
| A- | 3.7 | C- | 1.7 |
| B+ | 3.3 | D+ | 1.3 |
| B | 3.0 | D | 1.0 |
| B- | 2.7 | D- | 0.7 |
| C+ | 2.3 | F | 0.0 |
Say you took four courses in a semester: an A in a 3-credit class, a B+ in a 4-credit class, an A- in another 3-credit class, and a C in a 2-credit class. That works out to (4.0×3) + (3.3×4) + (3.7×3) + (2.0×2) = 40.3 total quality points, across 12 total credits — giving a semester GPA of exactly 3.36.
This calculator produces an unweighted GPA, where every course is scored on the same 4.0 scale regardless of difficulty. Some high schools also use a weighted GPA, which adds extra points for honors, AP, or IB courses — meaning an A in an AP class might count as 5.0 instead of 4.0. If your school reports weighted GPA, treat this calculator's result as the unweighted equivalent rather than an exact match to your transcript.
To calculate a cumulative GPA across multiple semesters, simply add every course from every semester into the table above at once — the math works the same way whether it's one term or your entire academic history.
For each course, enter the letter grade you received (or expect to receive) and the number of credit hours the course is worth. Add as many courses as you need — a single semester's worth, or your entire academic history for a cumulative GPA. Click Calculate, and the tool converts each letter grade to its point value, weights it by credit hours, and returns your overall GPA on the standard 4.0 scale.
Credit hours reflect how much coursework and classroom time a course represents, and GPA calculations weight grades accordingly because a course with more credit hours represents a proportionally larger share of your overall academic workload. This is why a strong grade in a high-credit course (like a 4-credit core class) moves your GPA more than an equally strong grade in a lower-credit course (like a 1-credit lab or seminar). Ignoring credit-hour weighting and simply averaging letter grades directly, without accounting for credits, produces a different — and generally less accurate — number than a properly weighted GPA calculation.
A semester (or term) GPA reflects only the courses taken during that specific term, useful for tracking how you're performing in the current period. A cumulative GPA reflects every course taken across your entire academic history at that institution, weighted the same way but summed across all terms rather than just one. Because cumulative GPA includes every past semester, a single unusually strong or weak semester tends to move it less dramatically than it would move a semester-only GPA — which is part of why an ambitious semester GPA target can look very different from the cumulative GPA movement needed to reach an overall goal, especially later in an academic program when many credit hours are already locked in.
If you're trying to reach a target cumulative GPA, you can work backward using your current total quality points and credit hours. First calculate how many total quality points you'd need at your target GPA (target GPA × total credits you'll have completed), then subtract your current quality points to find how many quality points your remaining courses need to contribute. Dividing that by your remaining credit hours tells you the average GPA you'd need to earn in your remaining coursework — a calculation that becomes especially useful for students trying to reach a specific GPA threshold for scholarships, program requirements, or graduate school applications.
While the 4.0 scale shown here is the most common standard in the US, not every institution uses identical grade-to-point conversions — some schools don't use plus/minus grades at all (a straight A, B, C, D, F scale), while others have slightly different point values for plus/minus grades than the ones shown here. Some schools also exclude certain course types (like pass/fail courses, or repeated courses where only the most recent attempt counts) from GPA calculations entirely. Always check your specific institution's official grading policy if you need your calculated GPA to exactly match what appears on your transcript.
How do pass/fail courses affect GPA? Most schools exclude pass/fail courses from GPA calculations entirely, since they don't have an associated point value — check your school's specific policy, as this varies by institution.
What happens to my GPA if I retake a failed course? Policies vary significantly by school — some replace the original F with the new grade in GPA calculations, others average both attempts together, and some keep both grades on the transcript with only the new one counting toward GPA.
Does this calculator match graduate school GPA requirements exactly? It calculates a standard unweighted 4.0-scale GPA, which most graduate programs use as a reference point, though some programs calculate GPA using only specific coursework (like major-related courses), which this general calculator doesn't isolate automatically.
Can I use this to calculate a high school weighted GPA? This calculator produces an unweighted GPA. For a weighted GPA that gives extra points for honors, AP, or IB courses, you'd need to manually adjust the grade points for those specific courses before entering them.
Does a withdrawal (W) affect my GPA? Most schools exclude withdrawals from GPA calculations, though policies vary — check your institution's specific academic policy for how withdrawals are handled on your transcript.
Can I calculate a cumulative GPA across multiple semesters using this tool? Yes — enter every course from every semester together, since GPA calculation doesn't distinguish between semesters, it simply weights all entered courses by their credit hours.
Last reviewed by Mehmed on July 11, 2026.