Key Takeaway
A VA disability rating reflects how severe your condition was on the day it was last evaluated, not how severe it is now. To get your VA disability rating increased, you file a claim for increased compensation and back it with medical and lay evidence showing the condition has measurably worsened. Filing also reopens your file for review, so the timing and the strength of your evidence matter as much as the request itself.
A Veteran rated 30% for a knee injury in 2015 may be a different person in 2026: two surgeries later, unable to stand through a shift, sleeping four hours a night because of the pain. The VA file, meanwhile, still describes the knee as it looked on the day of the last exam. Ratings do not update themselves. If you want your VA disability rating increased, you have to ask and prove the change with evidence a rater can point to in the record.
At the Law Office of Sean Kendall, we represent Veterans nationwide in rating-increase claims and appeals. If your current rating no longer matches your symptoms, contact our office for a review of your rating decision before you file.
Table of Contents
How Do You Get Your VA Disability Rating Increased?
You get a higher rating by filing a claim for increased compensation on VA Form 21-526EZ and submitting evidence that your service-connected condition meets the criteria for a higher percentage under the rating schedule. The VA then schedules an examination and issues a new decision. The VA's own instructions for filing a disability claim cover the mechanics. However, the part that decides the outcome is the evidence you put in front of the rater.
The sequence looks like this:
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Pull your most recent rating decision and read the diagnostic code the VA used. Each code has tiered criteria, and a higher percentage requires meeting all elements of that tier, not just most of them.
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Gather treatment records from the past year that document how much worse the condition has become.
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File the increase claim, or submit an intent to file first if you need time to collect records.
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Attend the Compensation and Pension (C&P) exam and describe your worst days honestly, not your best ones.
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Read the new decision closely. If the VA acknowledged the worsening but assigned the wrong percentage, that is an appealable error, not grounds to refile later.
When Is It Worth Filing for a Rating Increase?
The VA rates severity, so the question is not whether you still have the condition. It is whether the condition now interferes with your life more than it did at your last evaluation. Common signals that a claim is worth filing include:
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Symptoms that occur more often, last longer, or hit harder than they used to
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A new prescription, a higher dose, a procedure, or a referral to a different provider
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Work restrictions, reduced hours, a change in duties, or a job you could not keep
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Assistive devices you did not need before, such as a brace, a cane, or a CPAP machine
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A second condition that has developed out of the first one
If none of that has changed, filing is usually not the right move. Our options for improving an existing rating cover the alternatives worth weighing when a straightforward increase claim is not the right fit.
What Evidence Actually Moves a Rating Increase Claim?
Raters decide these claims on the record in front of them. Three categories of evidence carry the most weight, and most denied increase claims are missing at least one of them.
Treatment Records That Show Frequency, Severity, and Duration
Vague notes such as "patient reports ongoing pain" do not move a rating. Records that provide measurements, episode counts, and functional limits do so. Ask your provider to document the range of motion in degrees, the number of flare-ups per month, how long each lasts, and what you cannot do during one.
Lay Statements From People Who See You Daily
A spouse who describes the nights you cannot sleep, or a former supervisor who describes the shifts you missed, gives the rater something the clinical record rarely captures. Specific dates and concrete examples hold up; general praise of your character does not.
A Private Medical Opinion or Completed DBQ
A detailed opinion from a treating physician or an outside physician can counter a thin VA examination. The writer's credentials and the reasoning behind the conclusion matter more than the length. Understanding what makes an independent medical opinion persuasive is key.
Other Routes to a Higher Combined Rating
An increase on a single diagnostic code is not the only path to more compensation. Three others are worth evaluating at the same time.
Secondary Service Connection
A condition caused or aggravated by a service-connected disability can be rated on its own. Depression stemming from chronic pain, sleep apnea secondary to a respiratory condition, and neuropathy secondary to diabetes are all common examples. Our guide to conditions that develop secondary to PTSD walks through how these claims are built.
Decision Reviews When the Rating Is Wrong
If the VA had the evidence and still applied the criteria incorrectly, requesting a higher-level review puts a senior adjudicator on the file without new evidence. If the problem was a gap in the record instead, submitting new and relevant evidence through a supplemental claim is usually the better lane.
Individual Unemployability
A Veteran whose service-connected conditions prevent substantially gainful employment can be paid at the 100% rate without a 100% schedular rating. Unemployability benefits are frequently overlooked by Veterans who assume a 70% combined rating is the ceiling on what they can receive.
Can Filing for an Increase Backfire?
It can. Asking the VA to re-examine a condition reopens that condition for evaluation in both directions, and an examiner who finds improvement can support a reduction. That risk is real but manageable. Ratings that have been in place for five years are harder to reduce, ratings in place for 10 years cannot be severed absent fraud, and ratings held for 20 years cannot be dropped below the lowest level assigned during that period.
The practical safeguard is to file only when the record genuinely supports a worsening, and to know what a C&P examiner is evaluating before you walk into the appointment. Veterans who describe an average day rather than a bad one routinely undersell their own claims.
How Far Back Will an Increase Pay?
The effective date usually controls how much retroactive compensation you receive. Under 38 C.F.R. § 3.400(o)(2), when it is factually ascertainable that the increase in disability occurred before you filed, the VA can assign an effective date as much as one year earlier, provided the claim was received within a year of that date. This is why dated treatment records matter so much. A note from eight months before the filing date can be worth thousands of dollars in back pay.
One more piece of arithmetic surprises almost every Veteran: the VA does not add ratings together. A new 30% rating stacked on an existing 60% does not produce 90%. Running your numbers through a combined rating calculator before you file shows you whether a given increase would actually move your combined percentage, or whether your effort is better spent on a different condition entirely.