Of the 25,254 active New York City restaurants with a letter grade on file, 85.7% hold an A as their latest grade, 7.1% a B and 2.1% a C; the other 5.0% show Grade Pending. Queens has the lowest A share of the five boroughs (81.8%) and Manhattan the highest (87.5%). The bigger surprise is age: a third of those latest letters are more than a year old, and most C restaurants have been inspected again since their C was issued.
These are our own counts from the city’s DOHMH Restaurant Inspection Results dataset (file updated October 23, 2026, pulled October 24, 2026). For how to look up a single restaurant, see how to check NYC restaurant grades. For the same kind of count in Chicago, which records Pass, Pass w/ Conditions or Fail instead of letters, see Chicago inspection results by ZIP code.
How NYC turns an inspection score into an A, B or C
NYC scores by penalty points, so lower is better: 0 to 13 points is an A, 14 to 27 a B, 28 or more a C (NYC Health letter grading). An initial inspection is graded only when it earns an A. Otherwise it’s scored but ungraded, and an unannounced reinspection, typically within a month, sets the grade. A restaurant that gets a B or C at reinspection receives both the grade card and a Grade Pending card and may post either until its hearing at the OATH Health Tribunal (How We Score and Grade).
NYC restaurant grades by borough
| Borough | Restaurants with a grade | A | B | C | Grade Pending |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Manhattan | 9,874 | 87.5% | 6.2% | 1.7% | 4.6% |
| Staten Island | 885 | 87.3% | 8.0% | 1.4% | 3.3% |
| Brooklyn | 6,433 | 86.5% | 6.4% | 2.0% | 5.1% |
| Bronx | 2,247 | 85.6% | 7.7% | 2.4% | 4.3% |
| Queens | 5,789 | 81.8% | 9.0% | 2.9% | 6.3% |
| All NYC | 25,254 | 85.7% | 7.1% | 2.1% | 5.0% |
“Latest grade” is the grade with the most recent grade date for each establishment ID (CAMIS). Grade Pending counts the Z and P codes and the few N rows. What the Grade Pending code means and how long it lasts is in our NYC Grade Pending guide. The citywide total includes 26 establishments with no borough recorded.
NYC restaurant grades by cuisine
Among the 17 cuisine labels with at least 400 graded restaurants, the share of A grades (out of A, B and C) runs from 98.1% to 81.6%:
| Cuisine label in the city data | Restaurants with A, B or C | Share with an A |
|---|---|---|
| Donuts | 535 | 98.1% |
| Coffee/Tea | 1,981 | 95.9% |
| Hamburgers | 475 | 95.4% |
| Sandwiches | 412 | 94.4% |
| American | 4,332 | 93.0% |
| Juice, Smoothies, Fruit Salads | 474 | 92.6% |
| Italian | 900 | 92.1% |
| Bakery Products/Desserts | 848 | 91.3% |
| Chicken | 657 | 90.7% |
| Japanese | 899 | 89.4% |
| Pizza | 1,426 | 89.3% |
| Mexican | 975 | 89.2% |
| Spanish | 389 | 85.6% |
| Latin American | 943 | 84.7% |
| Chinese | 1,907 | 83.2% |
| Caribbean | 620 | 83.2% |
| Asian/Asian Fusion | 365 | 81.6% |
Read the top of this list as a menu effect more than a cuisine effect. Chains with short menus dominate it: Dunkin’ locations make up more than 80% of the Donuts label, and McDonald’s, Burger King and Shake Shack together are about half of Hamburgers. A label mixes chain counters with full kitchens. The label tells you nothing about a single restaurant, so look up the one you care about.
How old the grade in the window is
A grade card stays up until the next graded inspection, and that can be a long time. As of October 24, 2026:
- 8,925 of the 25,254 latest grades (35%) were issued more than a year earlier.
- The median age of a current A is 283 days; of a B, 381 days; of a C, 336 days.
- 387 of 532 restaurants whose latest grade is a C (73%) have had at least one inspection since that C. For B restaurants it is 805 of 1,793 (45%); for A restaurants, 2,786 of 21,655 (13%).
Under the city’s grading rules, a later visit can be the ungraded first inspection of a new cycle, a monitoring inspection or a complaint visit, and none of those replaces the letter on the door. That’s why the inspection list matters more than the letter for a B or C restaurant: open the record and read the newest dated inspection, its score and its violations.
About 6,100 more active establishments in the file have no grade at all. Until a restaurant has a graded inspection, the city lists it as Not Yet Graded.
Read a NYC score before the grade card changes
If the newest inspection has a score but no letter, enter it below to see which grade band it falls in and what the city does next.
Restaurant Inspection Check tool · rules checked October 21–23, 2026
Inspection score reader
Pick the program that inspected the restaurant, then enter what the report or door sign shows. The reader explains it on that agency's own scale and tells you what usually happens next.
For complaints about a grade or a hearing, see NYC restaurant complaints and OATH records. To compare NYC’s points with scales elsewhere, see what counts as a good inspection score.
How often the Health Department closes restaurants, why, and how long they stay shut is in our NYC restaurant closures analysis.
NYC Health pages checked October 24, 2026.