An HB Pencil is OK for the SAT – So are B or 2B Pencils as well

According to the College Board’s website and every piece of literature that writes about the items you bring for the test, you are supposed to bring the following writing utensils:

Two No. 2 pencils and a soft eraser

However, here in Hong Kong, students are used to “HB Pencils” instead.  Do these work?

Yes, they definitely are acceptable.  

According to the Hong Kong Examinations and Assessment Authority, they actually say for writing utensils, you should bring:

HB Pencils (No. 2 pencils) and eraser

on their Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) for the SAT & SAT Subject tests.  You can also bring: 

“B” or “2B” pencils as well according to the same FAQ.  

Basically, the “H” stands for “Hard” and the “B” stands for “Black” in “HB.”

While I’m not a fan of Yahoo Answers, their explanation of HB pencil lead is not bad:

Pencil lead is graded by hardness: a greater percentage of clay results in a harder lead. H (harder), F, HB and B (softer) are pencils of average hardness. Pencils ranging from 2B to 9B are softer still and are used for sketching; 2H to 9H are harder than average. A common American #2 pencil is equivalent to HB.

In order, the leads are (from hardest to softest) 9H | 8H | 7H | 6H | 5H | 4H | 3H | 2H | H | F | HB | B | 2B | 3B | 4B | 5B | 6B | 7B | 8B | 9B.

Google also provides a good explanation as well:

Generally, a #2 pencil is about the equivalent of an HB pencil. According to this system, pencils are graded on a continuum for “H” (hardness) and “B” (blackness), with a number to say how hard or how black it is. The more H’s you have, the harder the lead and the lighter the lines.