Many collectors are familiar PCGS #’s. They uniquely identify coins’ types and varieties and appear on every slab. They are 4-6-digit numbers. For example, an 1882-CC $1 is 7134, and a 1907 French 10 franc gold rooster coin is 477995. These numbers also appear if you do an online cert. # verification, in the pop reports, in auction prices realized and in Coin Facts. Less well known is that NGC has corresponding 4-character alphanumeric codes to PCGS #s that are called IDs. For example, the 1870 J-936 half dollar pattern has PCGS # 535397 and NGC ID 29Y8. These codes do not appear on slabs, or with cert. # verification or census reports. Mostly I see them stated in lot descriptions of auction companies. Does anyone know of a systematic way to obtain NGC IDs and is there an available concordance relating NGC IDs to PCGS #s? Cal
I think you would have to do lists yourself. Or, wait for both companies to merge and become one company, which isn’t very probable. I don’t know of anything like this that exists now. Doing it yourself would take a lot of research and time, which is why for TPGs it hasn’t happened yet, if it ever does. And what about ANACS and ICG? Don’t they deserve inclusion in a cross-reference list? I would think doing specialized lists for specific types or denominations would be a good way to start. The list(s) would be smaller and more definitive and others could be created later. Either way it would be a labor of love to produce…Spark
I think with PCGS, the numbers before the dash are used for specific coins, the number after the dash being the certification number. So, all for insurance have that same proceeding number, possibly a decimal point, but different cert numbers. The cert number on NGC coins is literally the submission number and a dash followed by the line item number. I'm not even sure on the NGC census site if there is a number like PCGS has that narrows down the coin to a specific issue.
What I call what you are asking about is a "Translation Table" or a "Lookup Table". I do not know of a publicly available Translation table between PCGS numbers (Industry Numbers), and the annoying distinct NGC numbers, but this table MUST exist because some auction companies list BOTH for each coin, and some always list the PCGS number even for NGC slabbed coins. So, either there is one available that exists for industry insiders, or all the big players have their own proprietary translation database. I would also like access to such a table, as translating these on the fly would be handy. Example from GreatCollections, my NGC graded Washington with it's PCGS number: If you use this industry ID say on Coinfacts, it comes right up: Not sure what the OP needs/ wants these for, but for me, using these IDs to find coins to buy, or while researching, greatly speeds up things as you are not having to type in "1966 25c blah blah blah" Especially for major / minor varieties, like DDO and other more niche versions of coins, the Industry ID is very handy, and so I like to use it. Hence, being able to quickly translate between NCC and PCGC would be awesome for us few people that use these to help automate coin finding.
Yes, the NGC equivalent exists, it's just not a widely used as the PCGS numbering system is. Here is how NGC themselves describe it: It appears to me that NGC also internally uses it less than PCGS, as its on fewer of their landing pages / sites, as already mentioned, its even missing from their Cert Lookup pages: If you click the NGC Coin Explorer Link on the cert page, it DOES list it:
I find the PCGS numbers very useful for searching Google and elsewhere. All the coins in my US collection database have the PCGS #s included. Sometimes when I'm looking at a coin up for auction and I search on the provided PCGS # at pcgs.com, I get a surprise because the coin is not what I though it was or it's an unusual variety. It's also a quick way to get to PCGS's limited auction prices realized for world coins. Their regular auction prices realized on their home page is US coins only. I agree the big auction companies must have a translation database for the PCGS numbers and NGC IDs or they have a html script that can find both for a particular coin. It would be too much work for both numbers to be looked-up manually for each individual coin. Cal
There are 3 numbers near the bottom of a PCGS label just above the bar code. The number to the left of the period is the PCGS #. Then between the period and the slash is the grade. The number to the right of the slash is the cert. no. For example, 9450.66/21391875 is a thick Norse medal (PCGS # = 9450), graded MS66 with a cert. no. of 21391875. Cal
Just a comment. The vast majority of the time you wouldn't have a problem doing that - but - there are cases where you could/would. Strike designations for example. There are cases where NGC and PCGS do not use/assign the same strike designation to a given coin. What NGC calls SP, PCGS may call MS or PF - or vice versa. So the NGC ID and the PCGS coin number are not always going to correspond to the same given coin. So by using those numbers to search for some coins there will be times when you come up with different results. There have also been times where NGC and or PCGS have changed their previous strike designation for some coins. Both of these things can easily create problems particularly when a crossover has been used. It's just stuff that one needs to be aware of if you are going to use these numbers for purposes of searching or anything else. And if you throw ANACS and ICG into the mix, well, I think you can imagine.
Both are proprietary numbering systems, which are the property of the respective company. PCGS goes further and assigns coin#s to slabbing varieties including labels. https://www.pcgs.com/pcgsnolookup
Not just the bible. My grandfather did a concordance of everything Abraham Lincoln said in speeches and letters. It was many large cases filled with 3x5 index cards, and was donated to either the Lincoln Library or the University of Illinois, can't recall which one. Just an aside.
