Snowboard Flex Ratings by Brand: Is a 5 Always a 5?
Almost every brand rates its boards from 1 to 10, but they don't use the scale the same way. We compared the flex ratings of more than a thousand boards from 22 brands.
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Flex is one of the most useful numbers on a snowboard, and almost every maker rates it on a 1 to 10 scale. The catch is that there's no shared standard. Each brand decides for itself what a 5 means. To see how far apart they are, we compared the ratings of the boards in our catalog from the 22 brands with at least a dozen rated models.
Average flex rating by brand
"Soft" counts boards rated 1–3, "medium" 4–6 and "stiff" 7–10.
| Brand | Rated boards | Average rating | Soft | Medium | Stiff |
| Burton | 48 | 4.2 | 20 | 23 | 5 |
| Bataleon | 71 | 4.5 | 22 | 43 | 6 |
| Technine | 25 | 4.6 | 5 | 18 | 2 |
| Salomon | 21 | 4.7 | 9 | 6 | 6 |
| Rossignol | 46 | 4.8 | 19 | 13 | 14 |
| CAPiTA | 89 | 5.3 | 12 | 63 | 14 |
| Rome | 57 | 5.5 | 6 | 38 | 13 |
| Ride | 12 | 5.5 | 0 | 9 | 3 |
| Never Summer | 62 | 5.6 | 4 | 45 | 13 |
| K2 | 43 | 5.7 | 4 | 26 | 13 |
| thirtytwo | 15 | 5.7 | 1 | 11 | 3 |
| Arbor | 64 | 5.7 | 6 | 37 | 21 |
| Nitro | 112 | 5.9 | 16 | 38 | 58 |
| United Shapes | 15 | 6.1 | 0 | 10 | 5 |
| Amplid | 18 | 6.2 | 0 | 13 | 5 |
| Gentemstick | 19 | 6.3 | 0 | 11 | 8 |
| YES | 34 | 6.3 | 1 | 18 | 15 |
| Moss | 53 | 6.5 | 0 | 33 | 20 |
| Nidecker | 16 | 6.6 | 0 | 9 | 7 |
| Jones | 65 | 6.7 | 3 | 21 | 41 |
| Lib Tech | 44 | 7.5 | 0 | 17 | 27 |
| GNU | 26 | 7.8 | 0 | 10 | 16 |
What it tells you
- The spread is big. Burton's boards average 4.2 and GNU's 7.8, more than three and a half points apart on a ten-point scale.
- Part of that is the lineup, part is the scale. Brands with many park and beginner boards will average softer, and brands heavy on freeride boards stiffer. Jones, for example, has more than half of its rated boards at 7 or above. But some of the gap comes from how each maker uses the numbers, so a "6" from one brand and a "6" from another may not feel the same.
- Medium is the norm almost everywhere. For most brands the biggest group is 4–6. A few, including Nitro, Jones, Lib Tech and GNU, have more stiff boards than medium ones.
How to compare boards across brands
- Compare within a brand first. A brand's own scale is consistent, so its 4 will be softer than its 6.
- Use the brand's average as a reference point. A 6 from a brand that averages 4.5 is relatively stiff for that brand, while a 6 from a brand that averages 7 is relatively soft.
- Read the profile and intended terrain too. Camber, rocker and the board's shape change how stiff a board feels underfoot. Our guide to how to choose a snowboard explains how they work together.
- Match your boots and bindings. A stiff board with soft boots, or the other way round, rarely feels right. See how to choose snowboard boots and how to choose snowboard bindings.
Some widely stocked examples
- Burton Custom Camber: rated 4 by Burton, an all-mountain board.
- CAPiTA D.O.A.: rated 5, an all-mountain freestyle twin.
- Lib Tech T.Rice Pro: rated 6, a directional all-mountain and freeride board.
- Jones Dream Weaver 2.0: rated 5, a women's directional all-mountain board.
By its maker's own standards, the Custom Camber sits near Burton's average and the T.Rice Pro on the softer side of Lib Tech's. You can filter every board by flex on our snowboards page.