What’s your situation?
- VA denied my claim: What to check after a denial
- I'm claiming this condition for the first time: How to file a VA claim for PTSD
- My current rating no longer fits: PTSD rating increase: showing the next level
- I have a claim exam coming up: C&P exam preparation
Deadline: An Intent to File can protect your potential effective date for 1 year — file it before you gather evidence Prepare an intent to file.
PTSD VA ratings: 0% to 100%
| Rating | Criteria — General Rating Formula for Mental Disorders (DC 9411) | In plain language | Watch for |
|---|---|---|---|
| 100% | Total occupational and social impairment, due to such symptoms as: gross impairment in thought processes or communication; persistent delusions or hallucinations; grossly inappropriate behavior; persistent danger of hurting self or others; intermittent inability to perform activities of daily living (including maintenance of minimal personal hygiene); disorientation to time or place; memory loss for names of close relatives, own occupation, or own name | Total occupational and social impairment — the condition prevents functioning at work and in social life. | This is the only level that requires total impairment in both work and social functioning. |
| 70% | Occupational and social impairment, with deficiencies in most areas, such as work, school, family relations, judgment, thinking, or mood, due to such symptoms as: suicidal ideation; obsessional rituals which interfere with routine activities; speech intermittently illogical, obscure, or irrelevant; near-continuous panic or depression affecting the ability to function independently, appropriately and effectively; impaired impulse control (such as unprovoked irritability with periods of violence); spatial disorientation; neglect of personal appearance and hygiene; difficulty in adapting to stressful circumstances (including work or a worklike setting); inability to establish and maintain effective relationships | Deficiencies in most areas — work, family relations, judgment, thinking, mood — short of total impairment. | Suicidal ideation and near-continuous panic or depression are the examples named at this level. |
| 50% | Occupational and social impairment with reduced reliability and productivity due to such symptoms as: flattened affect; circumstantial, circumlocutory, or stereotyped speech; panic attacks more than once a week; difficulty in understanding complex commands; impairment of short- and long-term memory (e.g., retention of only highly learned material, forgetting to complete tasks); impaired judgment; impaired abstract thinking; disturbances of motivation and mood; difficulty in establishing and maintaining effective work and social relationships | Reduced reliability and productivity — you function, but symptoms like weekly-plus panic attacks and flattened affect cut into work and relationships. | The examples include difficulty understanding complex commands and impaired memory for completing tasks. |
| 30% | Occupational and social impairment with occasional decrease in work efficiency and intermittent periods of inability to perform occupational tasks (although generally functioning satisfactorily, with routine behavior, self-care, and conversation normal), due to such symptoms as: depressed mood, anxiety, suspiciousness, panic attacks (weekly or less often), chronic sleep impairment, mild memory loss (such as forgetting names, directions, recent events) | Occasional drops in work efficiency with intermittent periods of inability, while generally functioning satisfactorily. | Chronic sleep impairment and weekly-or-less panic attacks are the examples the formula names at this level. |
| 10% | Occupational and social impairment due to mild or transient symptoms which decrease work efficiency and ability to perform occupational tasks only during periods of significant stress, or symptoms controlled by continuous medication | Mild or transient symptoms that reduce efficiency only during significant stress, or symptoms controlled by continuous medication. | A diagnosis controlled by medication still rates 10% when the medication is continuous — control by medication is written into this level. |
| 0% | A mental condition has been formally diagnosed, but symptoms are not severe enough either to interfere with occupational and social functioning or to require continuous medication | A formal diagnosis whose symptoms are not severe enough to interfere with functioning or to require continuous medication. | 0% still records the condition as service-connected; the percentage measures impairment, not whether the condition counts. |
Notes from the regulation:
- Schedule note (2): Ratings under diagnostic codes 9201 to 9440 will be evaluated using the General Rating Formula for Mental Disorders.
- The symptom lists are introduced by “such as” — they are examples of each level, not a checklist every veteran must match symptom for symptom.
Source: 38 CFR 4.130, General Rating Formula for Mental Disorders — DC 9411 (eCFR)
One formula for mental disorders
PTSD has no rating table of its own. Diagnostic Code 9411 sits in the mental disorders schedule, and the schedule's Note (2) directs that ratings under codes 9201 to 9440 — PTSD included — use the General Rating Formula for Mental Disorders, reproduced in the chart on this page. Every level is written the same way: a degree of occupational and social impairment, followed by example symptoms. That structure is why two veterans with different symptom lists can hold the same rating, and why the evidence has to speak to functioning, not just diagnosis.
38 CFR 4.130, General Rating Formula for Mental Disorders — DC 9411 (eCFR)
What the levels measure
Read the chart from the impairment clause outward. At 30%, the formula describes someone generally functioning satisfactorily with occasional drops in efficiency. At 50%, reliability and productivity are reduced. At 70%, there are deficiencies in most areas — work, school, family relations, judgment, thinking, mood. At 100%, impairment is total in both domains. The named symptoms — panic attacks, flattened affect, suicidal ideation — are the regulation's examples of each level, and a claim is strongest when the records show both the examples and the impairment they cause at work and at home.
38 CFR 4.130, General Rating Formula for Mental Disorders — DC 9411 (eCFR)
Service connection still comes first
Before any percentage, a PTSD claim needs the three elements VA requires: a current diagnosis, an in-service stressor, and a link between them. The stressor element is what separates PTSD claims from other mental-health claims — the event has to be identified and, in most cases, corroborated by service records. The how-to-file page in this series walks through each element; the criteria page walks through the formula itself.
PTSD evidence worksheet
A PTSD claim is decided on three elements — diagnosis, stressor, and the link between them — and then rated on functioning over time. Use this worksheet to assemble the record for each element before you file.
PTSD guides in this series
- PTSD VA rating criteria: the general rating formula
The complete General Rating Formula for Mental Disorders — 0% to 100% — that VA applies to PTSD under DC 9411, with a plain-language reading of every level.
- The PTSD DBQ and C&P exam
What the PTSD Disability Benefits Questionnaire covers — diagnosis, the occupational and social impairment summary, and the symptom record — and how it feeds the rating formula.
- How to file a VA claim for PTSD
The three elements of a PTSD claim — current diagnosis, in-service stressor, and a link between them — and the evidence that establishes each one.
- PTSD rating increase: showing the next level
An increase turns on impairment, not diagnosis: what has to change between the formula's levels, and the records that prove the change.
- Sleep apnea secondary to PTSD
How veterans pursue sleep apnea as secondary to service-connected PTSD — the sleep-study diagnosis, the nexus opinion, and how apnea itself is rated under DC 6847.