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Pick the system you think in — the grade is converted into it approximately, and the one the source wrote stays beside it in quotes. How the scales compare →
An approximation. These scales were built by different schools for different mountains: the normal route on Lenin Peak is officially 4A at 7,134 m where a guidebook would write PD. A converted grade always carries the original beside it in quotation marks.
| French (alpine) | F | F+ | PD− | PD | PD+ | AD− | AD | AD+ | D− | D | D+ | TD− | TD | TD+ | ED1 | ED2 | ED3 | ED4 |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| CIS | 1А | 1Б | 2А | 2А | 2Б | 2Б | 3А | 3А | 3Б | 3Б | 4А | 4А | 4Б | 5А | 5А | 5Б | 6А | 6Б |
| NCCS | I | I | II | II | II | III | III | III | IV | IV | IV | V | V | V | VI | VI | VII | VII |
After the UIAA comparison table. The systems line up closely here; a grade shown in a system other than the one it was recorded in is converted, and the original stands beside it in quotation marks.
| French (sport) | 2 | 3a | 3b | 3c | 4a | 4b | 4c | 5a | 5b | 5c | 6a | 6a+ | 6b | 6b+ | 6c | 6c+ | 7a | 7a+ | 7b | 7b+ | 7c | 7c+ | 8a | 8a+ | 8b | 8b+ | 8c | 8c+ | 9a |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| YDS | 5.2 | 5.3 | 5.4 | 5.5 | 5.6 | 5.7 | 5.8 | 5.9 | 5.10a | 5.10b | 5.10c | 5.10d | 5.11a | 5.11b | 5.11c | 5.11d | 5.12a | 5.12b | 5.12c | 5.12d | 5.13a | 5.13b | 5.13c | 5.13d | 5.14a | 5.14b | 5.14c | 5.14d | 5.15a |
| UIAA | II | III | III+ | IV | IV+ | V− | V | V+ | VI− | VI | VI+ | VII− | VII | VII+ | VIII− | VIII | VIII+ | IX− | IX | IX+ | X− | X | X+ | XI− | XI | XI+ | XII− | XII | XII+ |
The two tables do not connect: how hard the hardest move is says nothing about how grave the day is, and the other way round.
22 378 routes on 6 640 mountains — from the ordinary ways onto Elbrus and Mont Blanc to the faces of the Eiger, Ushba and El Capitan. Every route has its own page: grade, length, the year of the first ascent, the ground it crosses and the mountain it belongs to.
On 8 August 1786 Jacques Balmat and Michel-Gabriel Paccard reached the top of Mont Blanc by the south-east ridge over three summits, and mountaineering is counted from that day. That route is here, and it is the earliest first ascent of the 6 635 whose year is known.
On 22 July 1829 Khillar Khashirov, a guide with General Emmanuel's scientific expedition, was the first to stand on the east summit of Elbrus and brought a piece of basalt down from it; the rest of the party got no higher than 5,300 m. The northern line he took is still climbed.
On 14 July 1865 Edward Whymper and seven companions climbed the Matterhorn by the Hörnli ridge. The rope broke on the descent and four of them died — the golden age of Alpine first ascents ended on the day its last great four-thousander fell.
The summer of 1938 gave up two faces at once. From 4 to 6 August Riccardo Cassin, Gino Esposito and Ugo Tizzoni climbed the Walker Spur on the Grandes Jorasses — three days of hanging bivouacs on what was then called the last great problem of the Alps; the north face of the Eiger fell the same summer.
In 1951 Bradford Washburn found the West Buttress on Denali. More than nine in ten of everyone who climbs the highest point of North America now go that way.
The most climbed route here is the southern classic past the Priyut-11 hut to the west summit of Elbrus: 2,700 recorded ascents at grade 1B. Then the northern classic on Kazbek, with 845. These are not the hardest lines but the plainest: a short walk in, a hut on the way and weather you can sit out.
Ben Nevis carries more ways up than any other mountain here — 55 of them on a hill of 1,345 m, more than Everest has. Mont Blanc has 40, Ushba 25. The average route is 3.7 km long, and that is the ground actually covered, not the distance on a map.
How hard the crux is and how serious the day is are different questions, and they have different scales. French, YDS and UIAA answer the first; Alpine, CIS and NCCS the second — length, altitude, the way out, whether you can retreat. The ordinary route on Lenin Peak is officially 4A at 7,134 m, where a Western guidebook would print PD. 82 routes here carry 6B, the top of the CIS scale. The filters work on both axes at once, and the conversion tables are higher up this page.
A via ferrata is a route fitted with iron: a steel cable the whole way, rungs, ladders and bridges instead of rope and gear. The first Italian one was made in 1880, when the guides of Madonna di Campiglio equipped the east face of Cima Brenta for their clients. The dense network in the Dolomites was left by the First World War: Italian units fixed cables and set ladders to move men and loads across the rock of the front.
There are 1 637 of them here: most in Austria and France, 381 each, with 301 in Italy, and a few in the Crimean Mountains. They have a scale of their own, K1 to K6; 14 reach the top rung.