Abacus levels compared: why every program counts them differently
Eight, nine, ten, eleven, fourteen — the published ladders do not agree, because a level is a billing unit and not a unit of mathematics. Here they are side by side, with dates and sources.
Ask five abacus programs how many levels they have and you will get five answers: eight, nine, ten, eleven, fourteen. None of them is lying. A level in this category is not a unit of mathematics — it is a unit of billing, scheduling and certificates, and it gets rounded to whatever a term calendar or a franchise contract can carry. This page puts the published ladders next to each other, in each operator’s own words and with the date they were read, so you can compare the maths instead of the packaging.
Why the level count differs from program to program
There are three structural reasons, and none of them is about the child. First, a level is what a centre bills for, so its length gets rounded to a calendar: three months in several networks, thirteen to sixteen weeks in another. Second, certificates anchor the count — ALOHA’s Bangladesh master franchise awards a Basic certificate after Level 3, Master after Level 6 and Grand Master after Level 8, which makes eight the natural end of that ladder. Third, junior tracks are counted separately, so one curriculum can be published as six levels, as ten, or as six plus ten depending on whether the four-to-six-year-old track is folded in. Self-serve software splits more finely still, because there is no class to fill and no term to bill.
The vocabulary almost every ladder shares
- Foundation and Basic — bead positions, counting one to ten, then single-digit addition and subtraction with no rule beyond direct bead moves.
- Elementary A and B — the complement rules: five-complements, widely taught as the small friends, then ten-complements, the big friends. This is the actual content of the programme.
- Intermediate A and B — multi-row addition and two- to three-digit work, where accuracy down a long column becomes the limit rather than technique.
- Higher A and B — multiplication, by a single digit first and then multi-digit.
- Grand, or Grand Master — division and wider mental work. CMA in Singapore names its top band the Dan Levels, borrowing the Japanese term; Abacus4Everyone drops the vocabulary entirely for martial-arts belts, Yellow through Black, then numbered Levels 9 to 14.
Every published ladder, side by side
| Program | Levels published | Stated pace | Class time | Ages given |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Kani | 9, Foundation to Grand | self-paced, no term length | short daily sessions at home, no class | level is an explicit placement, never derived from age |
| ALOHA, Bangladesh master franchise | 6 Junior, then 8 Senior | 3 months per level: 18 months Junior, 24 months Senior | one 2-hour class per week | 4 to under 7 for Junior, 7 to under 14 for Senior |
| Brainobrain | 10, plus 6 LittleBobs modules | 3 months per level or module | not published on the main site | 7 to 14, and 4 to 6 for LittleBobs |
| SIP Abacus, a franchisee course page | 11 — Foundation 4, Advance 4, Grand Master 3 | 13 to 16 weeks per level | one weekly session of 2 hours 15 minutes, up to 15 students | classes 3 to 7, given as 8 to 12; Junior 6 to 8 |
| Mastermind Abacus, online programme | 8 | 3 months per level | twice a week for one hour, 1:5 teacher to student | 7 to 12 in the body copy, 6 to 12 on the same page’s form |
| Abacus Brain Gym, Bangladesh site | 6 junior grades, 10 senior grades | 18 months junior, two years senior | one 2-hour class per week | 4 to 7 junior, 7 to 14 senior |
| CMA, Singapore | Foundation, Intermediate, Advanced, then the Dan Levels | terms of 10 weeks | weekly sessions of one and a half hours | not published on that page |
| Abacus4Everyone | 14 — 8 belts Yellow to Black, plus Levels 9 to 14 | no term length published | self-serve app, optional teacher dashboard | not published |
One thing is worth saying once, plainly: no operator in this category publishes audited figures — Kani included. Level counts, durations, student totals and centre counts are all self-reported marketing. That is why this table carries a read date rather than implying it is live, and why rows sourced from a single licensee say so; franchise sites are written locally and age at different rates. We re-read every source when this post is updated.
What actually changes between the rungs
- Reading and forming numbers on a standard soroban: one bead above the beam worth five, four below worth one each, so every rod holds zero to nine.
- Counting one to ten, then single-digit addition and subtraction.
- Five-complements, the small friends — adding four becomes add five, take one.
- Ten-complements, the big friends — the carry into the next rod, and the rung where most children stall on every ladder.
- Multi-row addition: the same rule applied eight or ten times with no reset, so the constraint becomes attention rather than arithmetic.
- Two- and three-digit work, then the move off the physical frame onto a visualised one.
- Multiplication, and then division, which every ladder in the table places last.
Where the published numbers disagree with each other
- ALOHA International’s homepage carries the heading “OVER 4,000 CENTRES IN OVER 30 COUNTRIES” and, in body text on the same page, “more than 4,000 centers spread across more than 40 countries”. Neither figure carries a date on the page; both were read there on 30 July 2026.
- Brainobrain figures vary by page. One master-franchise site states “975 successful franchise centres in 42 countries” in body text while its own footer says “1000+ successful franchise centres in 45 countries”, and the same page cites “more than 4,00,000 students” where brainobrain.com’s About page says “over 500,000 students”. The company publishes all four figures undated; they were read on 30 July 2026.
- Mastermind Abacus’s online-classes page says “children aged 7 to 12 years” in body copy while the registration form on that same page says “6 to 12 Years old”.
- SIP Abacus’s own FAQ, published 21 January 2025, describes weekly classes “lasting around two hours” for children aged 6 to 12, while the franchisee course page in the table above publishes 2 hours 15 minutes for classes 3 to 7. Both can be accurate for different centres.
- None of this is deception. A network of hundreds of independently run centres cannot keep one number synchronised across every licensee’s website, and a stale footer routinely outlives the copy above it. It does mean a published number is a claim with a date attached, not a measurement.
The one grade that belongs to no company
| Ladder | Who organises it | What it takes | Published fee |
|---|---|---|---|
| Grades 1 to 3 | Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry, with the Japan Abacus Federation co-sponsoring | 240 of 300 points to pass | JPY 2,800 at grade 1 |
| Quasi-grades 1 to 3, and grades 4 to 6 | Japan Abacus Federation, with the Chamber co-sponsoring | 240 of 300 points for the quasi-grades, 210 of 300 for grades 4 to 6 | inside the same JPY 1,000 to 2,800 range |
| Grades 7 to 10 | Japan Abacus Federation, with the Chamber co-sponsoring | 120 of 200 points, and 60 of 200 at grade 10 | JPY 1,000 |
| Kyu 15 up to kyu 1, then dan ranks to tenth dan | League for Soroban Education of Japan, a separate body running its own ladder | 15 kyu grades including quasi-grades, then dan from quasi-first upward | JPY 700 at grades 11 to 15, up to JPY 3,500 for dan ranks |
| Flash Anzan™ grading: 20 kyu grades and 10 dan ranks | League for Soroban Education of Japan | sittings of 15 problems at member centres, 30 problems in unified sittings | JPY 700 for kyu, JPY 800 for dan |
Two things follow. A commercial “Level 8” means whatever the company printing the certificate decided it means, whereas a Japanese grade is a result an outside examiner measured against a fixed pass mark — which is why the Japanese ladder is worth knowing even if your child never sits it. And these bodies are independent of every program named on this page, Kani included: none of us can award their grades. If a provider’s marketing implies an external endorsement, the useful question is which body is actually named on the certificate.
Reading your own child’s level across two ladders
- Ignore the level number and ask what the child can do. Can they form any three-digit number without counting beads? Do the five-complements come automatically, or do they recount? Do they carry into the next rod without stopping?
- Match the skill, not the label. A child leaving Level 4 of an eight-level ladder is usually somewhere around the ten-complements, which on a nine- or eleven-level ladder is a different number entirely.
- Expect the visualisation stage, not a level boundary, to be the real discontinuity. Mental-abacus users appear to hold only three or four columns at a time, so moving off the frame costs accuracy before it returns speed.
- Do not restart from Foundation to be safe. Repeating a year of bead positions is the fastest way to lose a child who was already past them.
- Do not let age set the rung. Placement is a skills question, and at least one ladder in the table above publishes two different age ranges for the same track on the same page — which tells you how loosely age maps to content.
ALOHA, Brainobrain, SIP Abacus, Mastermind Abacus, Abacus Brain Gym, CMA and Abacus4Everyone are trademarks of their respective owners. Kani is not affiliated with, endorsed by, or licensed by any of them, nor by the Japan Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the Japan Abacus Federation or the League for Soroban Education of Japan. Flash Anzan is a trademark of its owner.