Know your target
84.2%
Watch the A-threshold drift session to session. A rising line means kinder grade boundaries; a dip flags the years where the A got noticeably harder to reach.
Past papers, ranked by guesswork
real grade thresholds
Every Cambridge paper rated Easy, Medium, or Hard — scored against other sittings of that same paper, from the official grade boundaries.
Used by students at
Built around the numbers that decide your grade
Cambridge sets grade boundaries after marking, so a harder paper gets lower ones. Each paper is scored against other sittings of that same paper — not against a fixed percentage.
Climb tier by tier
- Easy886
- Medium881
- Hard832
Start on the easy band to lock in technique, then step into the medium and hard papers as your confidence builds. Every band is relative to the paper itself, so the tiers mean the same thing in every subject.
Total coverage
23 subjects / 2,599+ papers
Everything you need to study smarter
Past papers sorted by how hard examiners actually found them — so you spend your time on the questions that move your grade.
Difficulty from official boundaries
Every rating comes from the published grade boundaries. When examiners drop the bar below where that paper normally sits, the paper was harder. It is difficulty by evidence, not by how recent the paper is.
- Easy
- Below its usual bar
- Medium
- About typical
- Hard
- Well under its average
Same paper, different session
Mathematics (9709) · Paper 52
52.0%
May/June 2018
88.0%
Feb/Mar 2024
A 36.0% swing for the same grade.
Every component, every session
A Level and O Level, every paper variant and component, ranked across more than a decade of exams.
Not all papers are equal — now you know which ones aren't
Recency has nothing to do with difficulty. ShinyPapers rates every paper against other sittings of that same paper, using the official grade boundaries — the marks students actually needed.
EasyAbove its usual barMediumA typical sittingHardWell below average
Difficulty
ComponentSessionA thresholdDifficulty
Paper 61Oct/Nov 202592.0%Easy
Paper 43May/June 202582.0%Medium
Paper 63May/June 202578.0%Hard
Built for students aiming for the top
“I used to grind through every paper in order and burn out halfway. Now I can finally see which papers are actually worth attempting first — so my revision time goes where it counts.”
Placeholder testimonial — swap for a real quote.