How Brazilian green coffee is officially graded

We work on the ground in Brazil, and we do not sell coffee. Nothing here is written to move a lot. It is written so you can read the grade on one.

The short answer

Brazil classifies green coffee under a MAPA act, Instrução Normativa nº 8 of 11 June 2003, which approves the technical regulation for classifying processed raw coffee beans. That system is usually called the Classificação Oficial Brasileira, or COB. It describes a lot along six dimensions: species, defect count, cup quality, bean size and shape, colour, and preparation.

Separately, a roaster buying differentiated coffee may ask for a Specialty Coffee Association grade, which is a private 0 to 100 cupping system with its own defect categories. The two coexist. A single contract can carry a COB type for the base description of the lot and an SCA score for a specialty micro-lot, and they are not interchangeable. "Type 2" is a COB term. "84 points" is an SCA term. Reading them as the same scale is the most common mistake in a green coffee negotiation.

Moisture has its own number, and it comes from neither system. The International Coffee Organization sets the ceiling at 12.5 percent, measured by ISO 6673. That is the figure to hold, not the tighter 11 to 12 percent that some contracts write in as a commercial condition.

The act behind the grade

The Classificação Oficial Brasileira is not a trade convention or an industry habit. It sits in Instrução Normativa MAPA nº 8, de 11 de junho de 2003, which approves the "Regulamento Técnico de Identidade e de Qualidade para a Classificação do Café Beneficiado Grão Cru," the technical regulation of identity and quality for classifying processed raw coffee. When a Brazilian seller describes a lot by type, cup and screen, that vocabulary comes from this act.

One honesty note on the citation. The full text of IN 08/2003, with all six dimensions and their scales, was read from a PDF hosted by the coffee industry association ABIC rather than from the official normative portal in.gov.br. The number, date and subject match the known structure of COB, and the act may also carry later amendments. Before writing "IN 08/2003" into a contract as a hard norm, confirm the consolidated current text on the official portal.

The six dimensions of COB

COB does not give a lot a single grade. It describes it along six separate axes, and a full classification names a value on each. Read together they are the legal identity of the coffee.

Dimension	What it measures	Scale
Categoria (species)	The botanical species	Categoria I, Coffea arabica; Categoria II, Coffea canephora, the robusta or conilon type
Tipo (defects)	Defect count by the New York equivalent system	Tipo 2 through Tipo 8 and beyond. Fora de Tipo means more than 300 defects, or more than 50 black beans (pretos), or more than 100 sour beans (ardidos)
Bebida (cup quality), arabica	The sensory grade of the brew	Estritamente mole, then mole, apenas mole, duro, riado, rio, rio zona. Best to worst
Bebida, robusta	The robusta cup scale, separate from arabica	Excelente, boa, regular, anormal
Peneira (size and shape)	Bean size and shape by sieve	Chato (flat bean): sieves 19/18, 17, 16, 15, 14. Moca (peaberry): sieves 13/12, 11, 10, 9. Bica Corrida is an unsorted mix across more than four sieves
Classe (colour)	Bean colour	Verde azulado, verde cana, verde, amarelada, amarela, marrom, chumbado, esbranquiçada, discrepante

There is also a sixth axis for additional characteristics: the preparation method (via seca or via úmida, dry or wet processing), the quality of drying (boa, regular, má), and the overall aspect of the lot (bom, regular, mau).

Two of these axes carry most of the commercial weight, so they are worth reading closely.

Tipo is a defect count, not a quality opinion. It runs on the New York equivalent system, where different physical defects carry different point values and the total decides the type number. A lower type number means fewer defects. Fora de Tipo is the floor: a lot with more than 300 defects, or crossing the black bean or sour bean limits above, falls out of the type scale entirely. When an offer says "Type 2," it is making a claim about defect count that a physical sample check can confirm or refute.

Bebida is the sensory axis, and for arabica it runs from estritamente mole at the top down through mole, apenas mole, duro, riado, rio, to rio zona at the bottom. The lower end of that scale, riado and rio, marks the cups the classification ranks worst. Robusta is graded on its own separate scale, excelente to anormal, not on the arabica words. A robusta lot described with arabica cup terms is described wrong.

COB is not SCA

This is the distinction that decides whether a buyer reads an offer correctly, so it is worth stating plainly.

COB is the official Brazilian system. It is written into IN MAPA 08/2003, it is the standard way a lot is described on the domestic market and in export contracts, and it works in the terms above: type by defects, bebida by the sensory scale, peneira by sieve, classe by colour.

SCA, the Specialty Coffee Association system, is private. It scores specialty coffee on a 0 to 100 cupping protocol, with its own Category One and Category Two defect classes and a water activity threshold below 0.70. Buyers and sellers use it by agreement for differentiated coffee. It does not replace COB, and it does not have the force of a Brazilian act behind it.

	COB	SCA
Status	Official, IN MAPA 08/2003	Private association standard
Applies to	All green coffee described on the Brazilian market and in export contracts	Specialty coffee, by agreement of the parties
Quality axis	Bebida, from estritamente mole to rio zona (arabica)	Cupping score, 0 to 100
Defect language	Tipo, New York defect equivalents	Category One and Category Two defects
Sample for grading	Physical evaluation on 300 g, sensory on a set of cups	350 g sample to grade

A contract can name both, and a good one often does: a COB type for the base lot and an SCA score for a specialty selection. The error to avoid is arithmetic between them. There is no formula that turns a Type 2 into an 84, because they measure different things by different methods.

Moisture, and why the ceiling is 12.5 percent

Moisture is the one green coffee number a buyer should never take loosely, because it decides whether a lot survives the transit without mould. The governing figure is set by the ICO, not by COB or SCA.

ICO Resolution 420, the Coffee Quality-Improvement Programme in force since 1 June 2004, states that exportable coffee should not have a moisture content below 8 percent or above 12.5 percent, measured by the ISO 6673 method. So the range is 8 to 12.5 percent, and 12.5 percent is the ceiling. The current edition of the method is ISO 6673:2025, which determines loss in mass at 105 degrees Celsius as the measure of water content.

The reason to be exact here is that commercial material often quotes a tighter "11 to 12 percent" as if it were the standard. It is not the norm. Individual contracts do sometimes write a tighter limit than 12.5 percent as a commercial condition, and that is their right, but the regulatory ceiling is 12.5 percent by ICO Resolution 420. Write the ceiling as the ICO figure and treat anything tighter as a contract term, not as the rule.

The same Resolution 420 sets a defect ceiling as well: arabica should carry no more than 86 defects per 300 grams, and robusta no more than 150 per 300 grams, on the New York or Brazilian classification. Those are the ICO exportability limits, sitting alongside, not inside, the COB type scale.

Screen size, read straight

Bean size in Brazil is the peneira axis of COB, and internationally it is measured by ISO 4150:2011, the sieve analysis method for green coffee size. The two describe the same physical thing, the size of the bean caught by a given sieve, in two vocabularies.

The chato sieves, from 19/18 down to 14, are flat beans sorted large to small. The moca sieves, 13/12 down to 9, are peaberries, the rounded single bean. Bica corrida is the unsorted running mix across more than four sieves, and it is exactly what its name says: coffee that has not been screen-sorted. An offer of "screen 17/18" is making a size claim; an offer of "bica corrida" is telling you no size sort was done. Neither is better in the abstract, but they are not the same product, and a bica corrida price should not be paid for a screened lot or the reverse.

What ends up in the contract

A green coffee contract that describes the lot properly names the species and then either the COB type set (tipo, bebida, peneira, classe) or an SCA score for a specialty lot, plus the maximum moisture with its method, the screen size, the defect limit, the crop year, and the origin region or state. The mandatory export papers, the ICO certificate of origin and the phytosanitary certificate, travel alongside. How those papers are checked, and how a lot is physically sampled against the grade it claims, are separate steps with their own pages.

Where this fits

The grade on paper is only worth what the sample confirms. Checking the exporter behind the offer is on verifying a coffee exporter, and the harvest timing and market figures that tell you whether a crop year claim is plausible are on coffee seasonality and market data. The physical sampling that tests a lot against its stated type, moisture and screen is pre-shipment inspection. The company-level check that applies to any Brazilian seller is verifying a Brazilian exporter, and the wider index is the Sourcing from Brazil hub.

Sources

• COB and its six dimensions, with the type, bebida, peneira and classe scales: Instrução Normativa MAPA nº 8, de 11 de junho de 2003, which approves the Regulamento Técnico de Identidade e de Qualidade para a Classificação do Café Beneficiado Grão Cru. Full text read from a PDF hosted by ABIC. Secondary on the exact wording: the number, date and subject match the known COB structure, but a direct check against in.gov.br was not made, and later amendments to the act were not confirmed. Confirm the consolidated current text before treating a specific scale value as a hard norm.
• Moisture range 8 to 12.5 percent by ISO 6673, and the defect limits of 86 per 300 g for arabica and 150 per 300 g for robusta: ICO Resolution 420, Coffee Quality-Improvement Programme, in force since 1 June 2004, ico.org, primary. The 12.5 percent figure is the ICO ceiling; a tighter 11 to 12 percent is a commercial contract option, not the norm, and is not stated here as a standard.
• Moisture method ISO 6673:2025 and screen size method ISO 4150:2011: iso.org, primary.
• SCA grading, the 350 g sample, zero Category One defects for Specialty Grade, and water activity below 0.70: SCA Coffee Standards, primary. SCA is a private association standard and does not replace COB.

Facts checked 8 September 2026. Brazilian normative acts are amended over time, and ISO editions are revised. Confirm the current text of IN 08/2003, ICO Resolution 420 and the ISO methods before relying on any scale or figure here.