The four criteria for assessing class importance apply to ring cairns as follows:
- Period (currency): Long-lived. The tradition of constructing and using ring cairns appears to have spanned much of the second half of the second millennium RCYBC, a period of perhaps five or six centuries.
- Rarity: Common. Although precise figures are not currently available it is estimated that between 250 and 500 ring cairns have been recorded in England to date.
- Diversity (form): Very high. On the basis of their construction and the presence/absence of a central mound, eight main types of ring cairn can be identified.
- Period (representativity): High. Ring cairns are among relatively few classes of monuments which can be assigned to the later second millennium RCYBC and are fairly distinctive of certain parts of Britain.
Assigning scores to these criteria following the system set out in the Monument Evaluation Manual, ring cairns yield a Class Importance Value of 45. This lies about two-thirds of the way up the range of possible values (max.= 64) reflecting the long duration and the great diversity of the ring-cairn tradition in England. Examples representing the full range of types, and variations in size and orientation, must also be included in the sample of nationally important sites.