Using The Carat Standard
By using The Carat Standard, you accept these terms and our Privacy Policy. If you do not, we ask that you not use the site. Using it on behalf of another person or organization confirms that you have the authority to do so.
Education, not appraisal
What we offer is education: a closer reading of the grading report. It is not a gemological examination, appraisal, laboratory grade, authentication, valuation, or recommendation to buy or sell.
A report alone cannot establish beauty, identity, condition, provenance, or value. For a decision of consequence, confirm what matters with the issuing laboratory and an independent, qualified professional.
Readings
A grading report is the opinion of the laboratory that issued it. The Carat Standard stands independent of every laboratory.
A Carat Standard score or reading is an educational interpretation—never a new grade, nor a promise of how a stone will appear. Readings can be incomplete or mistaken; compare every field with the original report.
What you share
Share only reports, links, and questions that are yours to share. Your material remains your own; you grant us only the limited permission needed to provide, secure, and improve the service, as set out in the Privacy Policy. We ask that you leave out anything confidential, and any personal detail the question does not require.
Acceptable use
You are welcome to view, share, and link to individual pages, and to quote brief passages with attribution and a link back.
Without our written permission, you may not:
- scrape, harvest, or bulk-download scores, readings, rankings, The Collection, or any other content of the site. Search and answer engines that honor our robots.txt are permitted;
- systematically query the site or its features, or use their output to reverse-engineer or replicate our method;
- republish scores or readings in bulk, or add them to another database, product, or dataset;
- interfere with the service, bypass its limits or security, or submit malicious or infringing material; or
- present a Carat Standard reading as a laboratory grade, appraisal, or guarantee.
We may block, limit, or restrict access to protect the service and those who use it.
Ownership
The facts on a grading report belong to the laboratory that issued it. Our writing, design, scores, readings, software, branding, and the curation of The Collection belong to The Carat Standard or its licensors. Laboratory names, retailer names, and other third-party material belong to their owners; a link to an outside site is not an endorsement.
Availability and changes
The service, its features, and its method may evolve, pause, or come to an end. We cannot promise uninterrupted access, or that every report can be read.
Disclaimers and liability
To the fullest extent permitted by law, the service is provided “as is” and “as available,” without warranties of accuracy, completeness, merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose, non-infringement, or uninterrupted availability.
To the fullest extent permitted by law, The Carat Standard will not be liable for indirect, incidental, special, consequential, exemplary, or punitive damages; lost profits or data; or losses arising from a purchase, sale, appraisal, insurance decision, reliance on the site, or inability to use it. Rights that cannot legally be excluded remain unaffected.
Updates and contact
When these terms are revised, the date above will change with them. Questions are welcome at hello@thecaratstandard.com.