Short answer: 74 is the highest score an idea can earn before it has customers. Scores of 75 and above are reserved for businesses that already trade.
Why is it like that?
A viability score is a bet on whether the market will say yes. Until you launch, that bet rests on research: demand signals, competitors, pricing, funding in the space. Research can make an idea look very promising. It cannot prove that anyone pays.
So we draw a hard line. Below 75, the score says "this looks worth building, here is what has to be true". At 75 and above, it says "the market has already said yes, here is how much". Letting a concept cross that line would make the top band meaningless, and a 78 with zero customers would tell you less, not more.
A 74 on a pre-launch idea is therefore the best possible result at that stage: a strong CONDITIONAL verdict, capped by the stage, not by the idea. The number ranks your idea against other concepts. The verdict tells you what would move it: proof.
Since when?
Scoring above 74 for operating businesses was introduced on September 6, 2026. Reports generated before that date were capped at 74 whatever the stage, because the report had no way to take your traction into account. If you ran a report on a live business before then, a new report with the traction row filled in is the way to get it scored as one.
How to score above 74
On the form, pick a live stage: Launched, Growth or Scaling.
Fill in the traction row that appears under it: when you started trading, how many customers, what revenue.
Run a new report.
What you enter sets the band. Figures you report yourself land at 75 to 79. Figures we can corroborate in public sources land at 80 to 84. Fully evidenced businesses land at 85 to 95. A business whose own figures show it isn't paying its way is scored under the concept rules, whatever the stage says.
Two things that won't lift the cap
Refining or editing an existing report. Those keep the original stage and facts.
Rewording the idea to sound more advanced. The score reads evidence, not confidence.
What a 74 is telling you
Your idea has cleared every check research can run. The remaining question is one only customers can answer, and the report's next steps are built around getting that answer as cheaply as possible.