Who Are the Judges in Cheerleading?

Quick answer: judges are trained officials who score each routine live, sitting at a panel in front of the performance floor. At most All Star events the work is split: some judges score building skills, some tumbling, some the overall routine, while separate officials track deductions and check that every skill is legal for the team's level.

What Judges Actually Do

Judges score specific, defined categories using the event's score sheet, rather than giving a single overall impression. For each part of the routine they assess difficulty (how hard the skills are and how many athletes perform them) and execution or technique (how well they're performed), and separate officials record deductions.

How Panels Are Structured

Panels vary by event producer, but a common All Star structure - used, for example, by the Varsity-led United Scoring System - splits judges into roles:

• Building judges - stunts, pyramids and tosses.
• Tumbling judges - standing and running tumbling, and often jumps.
• Overall judges - dance, formations and transitions, routine composition, creativity and performance.
• Deduction officials - recording falls, bobbles, boundary and time violations.
• Safety or legality judges - checking every skill against the level rules, and applying safety deductions for illegal skills.

Some scores combine several judges' views. Under the United Scoring System's 2025–26 overall sheet, for example, routine creativity is the average of the building, tumbling and overall judges' opinions.

Judge Training and Independence

Judges are trained in each category they score. The USASF certifies safety (legality) judges and provides judge training in partnership with event producers that use its scoring system, and event producers run their own judge education. Varsity, for example, requires its judges to have no direct affiliation with any team or gym in the division they're judging, and to attend monthly judges' webinars during the season.

Score Sheets After the Event

Coaches usually receive the score sheets after a competition, showing scores in each category and any deductions. Coaches use these to adjust routines - adding difficulty where a category scored low, or simplifying a section that keeps causing deductions.

Can a Team Question a Score?

Event producers have their own processes for questions - usually only coaches may raise them, through official channels, and often only about factual issues such as a deduction or a legality call. Some event producers also offer routine reviews before the season, where coaches can check that skills are legal in advance.

Why Judging Can Look Different Between Events

Different event producers use different score sheets, panel structures and judge pools, so the same routine can score differently at different events. Comparing scores between competitions is rarely meaningful - comparing placements within an event is.

Related Terms

See Score Sheet and How Is Competitive Cheer Scored?.