Choosing a diamond has traditionally been a complex process, since so many different characteristics combine to define the beauty of this precious stone. But now, deciding which diamond to buy is easier and more intuitive than ever: Thanks to our exclusive Angara Rating (patent pending) system, you'll get the one number that helps the most in judging your diamond's quality.

The 4Cs are only Part of the Picture By themselves, the 4Cs are not a complete buying guide for diamonds. They were created by an industry that didn't have a way of standardizing prices, and needed some level of comparability between stones. Cut, color, clarity and carat, therefore, became the focal parameters that were pulled out of the dozens used to determine a diamond's value.

Size and Quality A diamond's carat weight refers to the weight of the stone. This number simply tells you how large the stone is and is not affected by the stone's quality. In contrast, there are many factors that determine the quality of the stone. Quality can be determined by color, clarity and cut, in addition to other measures such as: culet, fluorescence, girdle size, polish and symmetry.

As a consumer, it is difficult to be able to compare diamonds across so many parameters simultaneously. While the current process makes it difficult, we believe that the objective for consumers is to find the ideal tradeoff between the right quality and the right size.

Enter the Angara Rating Our expert gemologists, (working with our gem-novice consumer experts), have developed a proprietary formula that analyzes a variety of different criteria including color, clarity, cut, culet, fluorescence, girdle size, polish and symmetry. All of these factors contribute to the quality of a diamond and should be assessed as a whole. The result is one score, on a scale of 0-100 that determines a diamond's overall quality, much like a Wine Spectator rating, or a Zagat Rating (though those are on 30 points.)

The Angara Rating can serve as a great starting point for your search, since we only choose diamonds that meet our strict requirements. Only diamonds with Angara Ratings of 80 and above are accepted.

So now you need know only two things to start: The Angara Rating of the stone, and its carat weight.