---
title: Evaluations
description: Add assessments that other people and applications can read, compare, and use in their own decisions.
---

# Evaluations

Evidence can tell us what happened. Deciding whether the work was useful often takes experience, local knowledge, or specialist judgment.

An **evaluation** records an assessment of work or another subject. It helps someone understand both the conclusion and the reasons behind it.

## Add a perspective others can use

A specialist reviewing a community energy installation might examine the production data, explain whether the system is performing as expected, and identify remaining issues. Local participants might assess a different question: whether the project is meeting the community's needs.

Both perspectives can be valuable. Hypercerts gives them a common way to publish an assessment without requiring one evaluation method for every field.

An evaluation can include a summary, name the evaluators, link to a longer report, cite measurements, and provide scores when those are useful. A score is easier to interpret when the reader can also see the method and evidence behind it.

## The assessment has its own author

An evaluator can publish through their own account and link the assessment to the work reviewed. They don't need permission to edit the project's activity, because they are creating a separate record.

This preserves the distinction between the team's description and someone else's assessment. It also lets a second evaluator publish a different conclusion. An application can show both rather than forcing every opinion into one project-owned report.

Being published separately does not automatically make an evaluation independent. Readers still need to consider the evaluator's relationship to the project and their expertise.

## Let the next decision build on the review

When the next funder considers the project, the earlier assessment is available for reuse. The funder might accept parts of it, seek a second opinion, or ask for newer evidence. The starting point is richer than an empty application form.

Evaluations can refer to the specific version of a record that was reviewed. This helps readers understand an older assessment when the project later updates its description. We'll explain that connection in [Records That Change Over Time](/architecture/data-flow-and-lifecycle).

For exact fields, see the [Evaluation reference](/lexicons/hypercerts-lexicons/evaluation).

Next: [Trust and Recognition](/core-concepts/certified-identity), to understand who stands behind these contributions and which signals matter to a decision.