What is the best Appel difficulty system?
March 20, 2026 at 7:00 PM
Appel has many difficulty systems used to measure how difficult a level is. Today, I’ll compare some of the most popular difficulty systems, go over their benefits and drawbacks, and at the end I’ll show the ones that you should use to rate your level.
Michael Chan System
The Michael Chan System was the first difficulty system created for Appel. This system uses two emojis to measure difficulty: Explosives (💥) and Bombs (💣). One bomb is equal to 10 Explosives. This difficulty system was popularized by Michael Chan’s project Absurd Appel, and is one of the most popular difficulty systems used for Appel levels, with almost all pre-2025 Appel mods using this system.
Advantages
- Most used system
- Simple and easy to understand
Disadvantages
- Not very precise
- Emojis don’t display on all devices
- Unclear difficulty ratings
Michael Chan Extended System
This extension to the Michael Chan system adds two more difficulty emojis: Sparks (⚡) and Dynamite (🧨). One Spark is equal to one tenth of an explosive, and one Dynamite is equal to 10 Bombs. This system is used alongside the Michael Chan system.
Advantages
- More precise
- Wider difficulty range
Disadvantages
- Unclear difficulty ratings
- More confusing
New Michael Chan System
This system, which replaced the Michael Chan system in the Absurd Appel DX update, rates levels’ difficulty on an integer scale from 1 to 15 (and possibly higher), as well as with plus signs after a difficulty (like 4+) showing a level is harder than most other levels at that difficulty. There are also tiers for the numbers, with Easy being 1 through 3+, Hard being 4 through 6+, Expert being 7 to 11+, Master being 12 through 14+, and Re-Master being 15 and higher.
Advantages
- Simple
- Wide input range
Disadvantages
- Not widely used
- Unclear difficulty ratings
Balanced Michael Chan System
This difficulty system uses Michael Chan’s system of Explosions, which go on a scale of 1 to 10, with 10 being the hardest possible level that can ever be made in Appel. Difficulty in this system is exponential, with the conversion from Michael Chan to Balanced Michael Chan being taking the cube root of the Michael Chan explosives and multiplying by 1.6.
Advantages
- Balanced
- Simple
Disadvantages
- Small range for very easy levels
- Not precise
New TheGrassyGuys system
This difficulty system splits levels into 6 tiers of difficulties, each divided into 3 subdifficulties. The 6 difficulties are Beginner, Intermediate, Advanced, Expert, Master, and Grandmaster, with Grandmaster also having higher tiers of Grandmaster II, III, IV, V, etc. The subdifficulties are put before the difficulty, and are Low, Medium, and High (such as High Master, Low Intermediate). This difficulty system was most notably used in Appel: Crystalline Peaks and Appel: Crushing It, and is one of the most used difficulty systems. The difficulty system is also used in the Grandmaster Zone.
Advantages
- Simple
- Clear difficulties
- Wide difficulty range
Disadvantages
- Some precision loss
Punter Scale
This difficulty system rates levels on a decimal scale from 0 to 15 and beyond. Levels can be rated with up to 2 decimal points of precision, such as 2.05 or 3.30. The difficulties, in order, are: Effortless, Easy, Medium, Hard, Harder, Insane, Expert, Extreme, Madness, Master, Grandmaster, Grandmaster+, Grandmaster++, TAS, TAS+, and TAS++. Higher tiers of TAS also exist, expanding to TAS+3, TAS+4, etc. There are also subdifficulty names for the decimal points after the main difficulty:
- Baseline: .00
- Bottom: .01-.10
- Low: .11-.25
- Middle: .26-.75
- High: .75-.80
- Peak: .80-.98
- Skyline: .99 The difficulty system is used by the ALDR.
Advantages
- High precision
- ALDR integration
- Clear difficulties
Disadvantages
- Complicated
- Not widely used in level packs
Scheeep/Scheeep Extended Scale
This scale was made by Scheeep and expanded by cwktao15764. It includes difficulties that progressively get harder, as well as subdifficulties similar to Punter Scale. The ratings are:
Normal
- Baby (0)
- Easy (1)
- Medium (2)
- Hard (3)
- Harder (3.5)
- Difficult (4)
- Intense (5)
- Remorseless (6)
Soul Crushing
- Insane (7)
- Insane EX (7.5)
- Madness (8)
- Extreme (9)
- Xtreme (10)
The Point of No Return
- ??????? (11)
- Impossible (12)
- Ascended (13)
- TAS (14)
- Cwktao’s Wrath (15)
The subdifficulties are:
- Transition (.00)
- Bottom (.01-.20)
- Low (.21-.40)
- Mid (.41-.60)
- High (.61-.80)
- Peak (.81-.98)
- Skyline (.99)
Advantages
- Precise
Disadvantages
- Unclear difficulties
- Complicated
- Barely used
1-5 Scale
Levels are ranked on a scale of 1 to 5, with 1 being Beginner, 2 being Intermediate, 3 being Advanced, 4 being Expert, and 5 being Grandmaster.
Advantages
- Simple
Disadvantages
- Small difficulty range
- Incredibly imprecise
Overall
Now that I’ve introduced these various difficulty systems, let me show you which ones you should use for different purposes.
General Level Difficulty
For sharing the general difficulty of a level, the best difficulty scale to use is the TheGrassyGuys Scale. This is because of its simplicity, and because it doesn’t lose that much difficulty precision. It also has a wide difficulty range.
Specific Ratings
For finding a specific difficulty rating of a level, the best difficulty scale to use is the Punter Scale. This is because it has a very precise system for comparing different levels to each other, is used in the ALDR, and has a wide difficulty range. It also has visual names and colors.
Thanks for reading my article about Appel difficulty. Have a great day!