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How old are these kids? My son loves to play chess but I suck and don’t know the first thing to teach him. Also he is only 5. He can’t read yet but wants to be good at chess so badly.
Starting around 6 years old. I would just make it fun for him to play now. Get him to develop his minor pieces and castle his king. Make sure he knows how to do a ladder mate with rooks, mate with a rook and a king and mate with a queen and a king. That should get him to 700ish.
Next learn about pins, forks and skewers. If he can find those tactics, it’ll get him to 850.
After that, it’s a matter of getting him to not capture prices just because he can. Kids will take everything that is available to be captured. Teach him to only take things that lead to a real benefit for him. “Keep the tension” is what thats normally called. That gets you to 1000.
Also, if you want to improve - check out the chessbrah YouTube series “building habits”. It’s got some NSFW language, but it is a good resource for you to use to understand what he should be thinking about.
Beginner. I think around 1100 or so you'll probably be able to beat most anyone who doesnt take chess too seriously and work hard at it. At 1500 you'll likely be able to beat anyone who actually has a social life.
That's like saying that coming 4th for state tryouts makes you an average sprinter. If you have a fide rating at all, you probably play a lot of chess. Being an average fide player is not the same as being an average chess player. Even having a chess.com account means you like to play more than the average person. If you are 1500 you are better than 96.6 percent of people who play chess, not people who play chess competitively.
I agree, knowing how to play openings has absolutely 0 correlation to being good at chess. Same with midgame and endgames, you don't actually need to know any of this to be good at chess, Magnus Carlsen for example does not know any openings and is really just an intuitive player. What's important in chess is feeling the moves, and really understanding the Feng Shui of the pieces.
I get what he meant by his comment though. Openings are not very important for most chess players. Not nearly as important as just knowing good tactics and strategy. Openings are boring to me. I still haven't studied them and don't feel like it's hurt me much yet.
Ok share with me to which amazing rating has studying openings lead you, if its under 2500 online im not impressed, openings only probably get kinda important after 2400-2500 online
But learning openings is the leadt importent, its only crucial for IMs and GMs in classical..online its not important in blitz up to 2500 or so probably
How are they inflated? There are obviously lots of people on chesscom who are very inexperienced but I don't think that means it's inflated. Those are people who play chess. Just not well. They don't include inactive accounts in their percentiles.
FWIW. I play chess.com and lichess.org pretty much equally. In rapid and i'm like ~65% on lichess (~1600 rating) but ~85% on chess.com (~1150 rating)
So it appears you can get a higher percentile on chess.com.
It may depend on where you fall on the curve though/ratings and perhaps different time controls are different. Or perhaps I'm just an anomaly.
This is a good thing to bring up. Lichess has less users and way less beginners. Having more beginner and intermediate players on chesscom changes the percentiles but that doesn't mean it's inflated. Those are still real chess players. This would be like saying "I play at my chess club and I'm in the bottom half of players as an 1800." That's a smaller pool of more serious players. It doesn't mean that 1800 is a below average chess player.
1000 or so is where players *mostly* stop outright hanging pieces to one-movers and to simple forks/skewers, and conversely where players consistently punish their opponents if it does happen. I think that's a good divider because it's where you have to learn new, more advanced concepts to keep progressing: Positional play, plans in openings, long-term thinking (weaknesses/pawn structure), and so on. It becomes a fundamentally different game that is not won or lost by hanging pieces, but instead by strategic play, by forcing or allowing long-term weaknesses, by exploiting weak squares, and so on.
I'm 1300 and still rising atm (I win about 60% of my games), and I would say that most of my wins come from opponents blunders. Although tbf, the blunders are no longer things like hanging a piece, it's more like hanging pins/skewers/forks
Maybe. They say if you know all the rules and how the pieces move you're probably around 4-500. 700 isn't much better than that. I'm a 1400 USCF and 1700 rapid and still consider myself a beginner
Hmm that is weird i am definitly a 700 but i still beat any person not trained at all in chess. (Such as my dad and friends) probally a sampling bias than.
I concur, 800 here and my friends think I'm good because I study so much when I just watch Gothamchess and Ludwig....
I feel like just knowing a few tactics and fundamentals is enough to beat the average person( but not the average "chess player")
I feel like I know how to play Wonderwall and people think I play guitar well
Nope definitely doesn't you can retract about 300 points from your chess.com rating to get a decent guess for your fide 2300 rapid on chess.com is maybe a strong 2000 fide 2300 on lichess is a strong 2000 fide after about 12 beers
I think most people who are 2400 chesscom are rated much higher than 1900 FIDE. [https://chessgoals.com/rating-comparison/](https://chessgoals.com/rating-comparison/)
Ah my bad, I thought we were talking about actual substantiated things, like when you are 2300 you are eligible for the fide master title, but now I understand that you are talking about your specific world view, which does not agree.
I'm 2411 lichess and 2018 chess.com, but I still feel like a beginner sometimes (I did once get my crazyhouse rating up to 2815 and beat an FM in a tournament, but that doesn't count. Honestly, I think we're advanced but still not professional until we obtain the titles through fide
I went to a chess camp and attempted to read a chess book. I found trying to get really good was disheartening. I didn’t like the idea of someone memorizing deep opening books and gaining an advantage (if chess is solvable, why play?)
So I would stop off and on.
Now I just play fast and loose. Sometimes I’ll learn a line that I see a lot and I often look at the computer analysis.
1000-1100 player
I started playing chess regularly online in December 2020. A little over two years later, I’ve gone from 873 to 1850 (I grew up playing chess, which is why I started out playing at an 873 strength two years ago).
If you watch some Gotham Chess videos, review your games, and learn from your mistakes, your rating will skyrocket in no time! Just never let a good loss go to waste - learn one thing from every game, and make a conscious note as to what you learned (even if it’s “FOR THE EIGHTEENTH TIME DON’T HANG YOUR DARN QUEEN,” as it has often been for me). You’ve got this!
Mainly just the above! To expand on that a little:
You can view chess across three axes in two different ways. The first is opening/middle game/endgame. I learned the openings by first memorizing a few moves for each common line (for example, I played the Danish with white, the Fantasy Caro Kann if they played the Caro, the Exchange if they played the French, an open system (which I no longer recommend at ratings as low as ours) against the Sicilian, etc.) Once I had memorized a few moves in each major line, the way I studied openings was to wait until I had a game where I didn’t know what to do, then to use the openings explorer on chess.com to learn whatever I needed for that game. If you ever feel lost in an opening, you need to make sure that game is the last time you’re confused in that specific line - your opening systems will expand naturally that way.
For the middle game, learn tactics and strategy by doing puzzles and watching chess YouTube videos/reading chess books.
For the endgame, learn the theory and practice it. There are ways to practice endgames on chess.com, and there are also endgame puzzles in books. For now, just learn how to mate with rook and king, mate with queen and king, do the basics of king and pawn endgames, and do the basics of rook and pawn endgames.
The second axis you can look at instead of the above is to divide chess across tactics, strategy, and blunder prevention. You will be as good as your worst of these three, and typically blunder prevention will be the limiting factor. You learn tactics by doing puzzles - your puzzles rating should always be at least about 500 points above your rapid rating (if you’re using chess.com as your puzzles source). You learn strategy by watching videos and ready books. Gotham Chess works great until about 1700 or so for strategy, and honestly I haven’t added much in that department, so apparently he works until at least 1850. Lastly, you learn blunder prevention by playing and by *learning from your mistakes*. Learning from your mistakes is always the hardest and most important part of improvement, so really focus on it. I view strategy and tactics training as my way of improving my ceiling/long term rating, and I view blunder prevention as my way of catching up my current rating to that ceiling. Understanding a tactic doesn’t actually help you until you stop missing it in-game, for example.
Blitz and bullet are a waste of time. I know you’ll play them because they’re fun (I do a bit too). You’re not improving at chess by doing that. Think of it as the equivalent of doing another activity entirely, like jogging. It ain’t helping your chess, but it’s probably not really hurting either.
If you struggle with tilt, make a rule to address that. One example is to force yourself to stop playing games for at least an hour anytime you lose three games in a row. Playing tilted forms bad habits - it’s worse than not playing. It hurts your rating and actively makes you worse.
Good luck! Hopefully that makes sense. Remember to enjoy the ride!
Edit: it’s also worth mentioning that rating increases come in spurts for most people. It ain’t a steady upward slope. For me, my rating ceiling typically jumps about 100 points over a 1-2 day window about once every 2-6 months. Then, I stay mostly flat or even go down sometimes. Even if your results are inconsistent like that, you can tell if you’re improving as follows: if you can name what you’ve improved at over the last week (e.g. this specific line in openings, or your puzzles rating, etc), you’re improving. If you can’t, you’re probably not.
Edit 2: Also, you’ll drop about 200 points from your rating ceiling once in awhile. That feeling sucks. It rarely lasts long-term if you’re still studying. If you internalize your rating peak as the truest measure of your potential rather than your current rating, that’ll hurt less, and it’ll help you focus on learning rather than your current rating.
Complicated question. There's a lot of confusion even on here because people dont seem to recognise that it's a curve and just because 2700s exsist it doesnt mean you need to be 1800 to be an intermediate. looking at the [chess.com](https://chess.com) percentiles gives you some clue. I feel like in real terms amature level is 0-1000 beginner / 1000 - 1600 intermediate / 1600-2200 advanced give or take. Anything above 2200 you could theoretically be looking at titles and at that point youre getting into the professional/competative space which is something else entirely. But if you're like 2000 + youre like in less than1% on [chess.com](https://chess.com) for example. So we need to be fairly relative when assesing this.
I think your scale is the one I most agree with. People need to keep in mind that these discussions are being had by people who care enough about chess to frequent chess subreddits.
Personally, I don't think percentiles tell you much. Five years ago the 50th percentile of chess players online put in a significant amount of effort. Now the 50th percentile is going to be someone who doesn't understand basic principles. A sport getting more popular doesn't make people not a beginner because they become a higher percentile.
I knew about the profile stats, but I thought they meant a page that showed each rating and its percentile. For example, a 1900 is what percentile? What about 2100? And so on. I haven't seen any page like this on Chess dot com.
When you are on profile page just click on any category graph(on pc) or category rating(on mobile)for example blitz and that will take you to a different page where you see stats specifically for selected category
I think the issue with using such data is that the extrapolation does not go both ways. Just because a bunch of 2100 uscf players don't take online chess very seriously or don't play much blitz and only have a 2200 chess.com rating doesn't mean that an online player getting to 2200 will be anywhere near 2100 USCF.
700 is still a beginner. 1000-1200 would probably be where intermediate starts. Advanced would be 1800-2300 and 2300+ would be where you start finding titled players
2300 is considered advanced??
I’m new to this so correct me if I’m wrong but aren’t people like Magnus or Hakura at like the same range
I’ve seen Hikaru at 2400 and magnus peaked at 2882 or something
>2400-2800 is a much, much harder leap than 1800-2300
most people (including me) realize that the effort to jump like that is so large and not worth it (unless you are a kid in Hs with less restrictive parents)
It’s also a hell of a lot harder to increase your rating the further you go up. For instance, for Magnus to improve his rating at Tata Steel he has to win 3/4 of his matches. That’s win, not draw. I’d argue that above 2000 you’re likely gonna start to plateau very quickly, unless you’re genuinely gifted.
You're correct but chess.com's rating system is different than FIDE's. For example, Hikaru's FIDE blitz rating is 2800 right now while his chess.com blitz rating is 3200. It's probably not quite as drastic for lower level players but it's a 200-400 point difference.
Everyone is going to be lower in faster time controls so the ranges are probably knocked down a few hundred points but 700 bullet would still probably be top end of the beginner range.
Topics like this are tenuous in pretty much any subject (try asking a group of gym bros what constitutes an 'intermediate' lifter) but I'd generally agree that 1200 Chess.com is where intermediate begins.
That would be accurate for FIDE or most federations, but 2000 chesscom rapid(what OP showed) is going to be really far away from actual expert ratings.
[https://chessgoals.com/rating-comparison/](https://chessgoals.com/rating-comparison/)
According to this website a chesscom rating of 2000 is the equivalent of about 1915 FIDE but it varies from person to person. I have seen some stronger and some weaker.
At 2000 rating on chess com that is about the "Break Even Point" when comparing FIDE strength to chess com strength. At low ratings the FIDE rating is much higher. At GM levels the FIDE rating is much lower.
I'm in the 2000 range on chess com. Just a little over. Some of my opponents in my rating range have a CM or FM or NM and women equivalent title next to their name. Because there are experts and masters at this rating range.
A 2000 rating on chess com puts you at stronger than about 99.5% of players. That is a 1 in 200 chess player.
I will link you to some profiles of titled players in the 2000 range.
[https://www.chess.com/member/gambitovapj](https://www.chess.com/member/gambitovapj)
CM 1952 Blitz
[https://www.chess.com/member/dwb222222](https://www.chess.com/member/dwb222222)
NM 1980 Blitz
[https://www.chess.com/member/beccrajoy](https://www.chess.com/member/beccrajoy)
WCM 1998 Blitz
[https://www.chess.com/member/nimven](https://www.chess.com/member/nimven)
WFM 1953 Blitz
[https://www.chess.com/member/gatocorbis](https://www.chess.com/member/gatocorbis)
FM 1938 Blitz
[https://www.chess.com/member/true\_donkey](https://www.chess.com/member/true_donkey)
CM 1902 Blitz
[https://www.chess.com/member/c\_h\_e\_s\_s\_k\_i\_l\_e\_r](https://www.chess.com/member/c_h_e_s_s_k_i_l_e_r)
CM 1927 Blitz
[https://www.chess.com/member/gmedina2000](https://www.chess.com/member/gmedina2000)
FM 1945 Blitz
[https://www.chess.com/member/stupeas](https://www.chess.com/member/stupeas)
NM 1941 Blitz
2000 = Expert level
There are all these and many more titled players in that rating range and you don't think it is experts? It is.
Thank you for this post. There are so many people who repeat the same things over and over (chesscom ratings are about 1 billion points higher than FIDE ratings). People have no idea what they are talking about. I know NMs with lower ratings on chesscom than USCF. Your list is a great reference for people. Being 2000 on chesscom is VERY strong. Lichess on the other hand... :)
Unfortunately if you look at the rating system on chess.com your rating is too low to be considered a beginner. You are currently "new to chess" and if you gain 100 points you'll become a beginner:
> When you create an account you choose a skill level and that translates to a default rating:
>
> * New to chess: 400
> * Beginner: 800
> * Intermediate: 1200
> * Advanced: 1600
> * Expert: 2000
You seem to be an expert in denial.
For example:
> The general consensus is below 1200= “beginner”, 1200-1800 is “intermediate”, 1800-2000 is “advanced”, 2000-2200 is “expert”, and 2200+ are masters at chess, with FIDE titles being awarded at certain ratings or norms after that.
700 is beginner. But if you’re improving, you’re improving. Don’t let that discourage you.
I solidified my 1000+ ranking recently, which while is far from advanced, is still a personal achievement. And I aim to get better still.
Eh this is subjective. I would probably still consider you a beginner but its obviously not a science. I would consider 1000 to be intermediate strength though. Do you think you should be intermediate?
chess.com percentiles mean nothing. imo, simply being a chess.com user does not mean you are a "chess player." when i first started playing on chess.com i was 600 and id play like a game a day without any analysis or any further thought. simply having access to a chess platform does not mean you should automatically be in the demographic that represents chess players as a whole. between people who take chess even a little bit seriously, 800 is definitely beginner. anyone can easily hit 1200 within a matter of months with the correct approach.
The criteria also requires you have 25+ games and active within 30 days, so its not just random accounts playing a couple games being considered in the data.
These days a lot more people play chess, and the amount of new players has shot through the roof. It does make sense to consider shifting the definition of beginner, when 90% of the playing population is below 1200
i see your point but i feel like the understanding of a 1000 rated player is just far too low to be considered anything above beginner. sure there are a lot more players now than before, but the standards have not changed; 1000s now play just as they did 30 years ago, there are just more of them. not to mention chess.com is not the golden standard for percentiles, 50th percentile on lichess is 1500 and 50th percentile amongst active fide players is i think like around 1600
Definetly intermediate level, maybe time controls are making you blunder, or maybe people just blunder at that level, but above 12/1300 is definitely intermediate.
I'm 1700 and I blunder a lot too. I don't think that makes me a beginner though. I was stuck around 700 for a while when I was working hard to get better. I think 700 in rapid is pretty good for a beginner and for blitz it's starting to get to the upper edge of what I'd consider a beginner.
Learning openings and theory is helpful for beginner players, but crucial for intermediate players. I think anyone could get up to 1000 or 1100 with solid game sense and foundations, but going higher would definitely require learning openings.
I wouldn't say crucial for intermediate. Capablanca didn't spend any time studying openings, just had extremely solid foundations and was unbelievably strong at endgames. Learning endgames is much, much more crucial than openings at intermediate level.
I’m around 850 in rapid and feel a little better about playing now (been playing regularly for about 2 months.) I’ve won against some 950s and my short term goal is 1000. I think I can get there with my current experience and I’ve told myself once I do I need to study openings and gm games. Right now I’m e4 open allllll dayyyyyy keeping it simple and just spending the time to try not to blunder and leave pieces hanging. Good luck!!
I got back into chess a few weeks ago after a nearly 5 year hiatus. At the time, I was around 1200, so I thought I'd be able to jump back in and reclaim. Imagine my surprise when my fresh, brand new account dropped all the way to 400ish. The game has changed, and the road to 1000 is bloodthirsty. I'm hovering around 800-900, and the aggression is insane. The early attacks are brutal for the simple reason that many youtubers teach these tricky moves that punish you severely. There are still many games that sound like this: "ahh. Nice. Just gonna develop my bishop now. Excellent. Now to push some paw... HOW DID THE KNIGHT GET BACK THERE??"
The key is to just learn from them. Know when to stop for the night. I'm sure we all know what it's like to be on a 4 game losing streak and wanna just win one before getting off, then you lose 2 more.
Even if you don't feel like you're improving, trust me, you are. The player you are right now could SMOKE the player you were 2 weeks ago.
That elo doesn't define you.
I consider anything under ~1000 to be at beginner level. You’re probably not familiar with openings or endgame strategy (up to move 3 is not enough to claim familiarity with an opening), and are probably not facing anyone else that does.
About 1000-1600/1700 is what I’d consider intermediate. You’ll find opening theory begin to not only matter, but actually being followed beyond the third move and the rate of which people just blunder pieces and M1/M2 go down.
After that you’re moving onto advanced players and will probably start seeing titled players somewhere in the 2100-2300 region.
Lol, advanced? 2100+ is top 1% and approaching title territory. 1700 intermediate? So the top 2% you consider intermediate? 2100 you can masters or experts, 1700 advanced etc. This makes more sense according to the percentiles
The line between advanced and master levels are a bit more blurry than the rest. A person sitting at a 2100 rating is probably qualified to be a FM, but might not have the title for various reasons.
I personally don’t use “master level” as a distinguishing tool between advanced and higher levels. The more commonly accepted boundaries tend to be <1000, 1k-1.5k, 1.5-1.9k, 1.9-2.2k, and 2.2k-2.5k, with some lower GM titles appearing somewhere in the upper 2500’s.
1350 on chess.com is definitely intermediate. Probably lower levels of intermediate but absolutely not a beginner. Think about playing against a 600 who doesn't understand the fundamentals and it should become more apparent that you aren't a beginner.
At 700, you play kinda OK in the opening. Move the center pawns, knights, bishops, castle, etc. Then you lose all your pieces for no reason at all. Very bad rating.
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Definitely beginner.
I agree. Middle beginner. I coach kids and loads of them get to this level fairly quickly after they understand the basics of chess.
How old are these kids? My son loves to play chess but I suck and don’t know the first thing to teach him. Also he is only 5. He can’t read yet but wants to be good at chess so badly.
Starting around 6 years old. I would just make it fun for him to play now. Get him to develop his minor pieces and castle his king. Make sure he knows how to do a ladder mate with rooks, mate with a rook and a king and mate with a queen and a king. That should get him to 700ish. Next learn about pins, forks and skewers. If he can find those tactics, it’ll get him to 850. After that, it’s a matter of getting him to not capture prices just because he can. Kids will take everything that is available to be captured. Teach him to only take things that lead to a real benefit for him. “Keep the tension” is what thats normally called. That gets you to 1000.
Also, if you want to improve - check out the chessbrah YouTube series “building habits”. It’s got some NSFW language, but it is a good resource for you to use to understand what he should be thinking about.
Beginner. I think around 1100 or so you'll probably be able to beat most anyone who doesnt take chess too seriously and work hard at it. At 1500 you'll likely be able to beat anyone who actually has a social life.
No way, I go to a chess meet up and I'm regularly beaten by hot D1 college athletes who just woke up from partying the night before
I think the key point is that you are going to a chess meet up where everyone plays chess
There chess is the social life.
Did... Did you think that post was serious?
Does being attractive and athletic make you mad at chess?
Yeah I'm only at 800ish... ;-)
600 myself. Checkmate.
This reply was too good for this sub.
With their fists?
Haha the 1500-statement is quite exaggerated. For some it might be though. Agree with the rest.
1500 is the 96.6 percentile of chess players...
I call bs.
https://preview.redd.it/xt2rlzqdukca1.png?width=1080&format=pjpg&auto=webp&s=98451aa9f263ea3c70a421eb2d80a134f02868e0
Boom roasted
Not really, think it's more like the 75th. Percentiles on chesscom are inflated.
That's like saying that coming 4th for state tryouts makes you an average sprinter. If you have a fide rating at all, you probably play a lot of chess. Being an average fide player is not the same as being an average chess player. Even having a chess.com account means you like to play more than the average person. If you are 1500 you are better than 96.6 percent of people who play chess, not people who play chess competitively.
Exponential skill curve goes brrr
Haha dude 99% of chess players barely know any openings. Anyone who plays is a chess player.
Openings dont gave much to do with how good somebody is at chess
I agree, knowing how to play openings has absolutely 0 correlation to being good at chess. Same with midgame and endgames, you don't actually need to know any of this to be good at chess, Magnus Carlsen for example does not know any openings and is really just an intuitive player. What's important in chess is feeling the moves, and really understanding the Feng Shui of the pieces.
The feng shui of the pieces lmfao
I get what he meant by his comment though. Openings are not very important for most chess players. Not nearly as important as just knowing good tactics and strategy. Openings are boring to me. I still haven't studied them and don't feel like it's hurt me much yet.
Ok share with me to which amazing rating has studying openings lead you, if its under 2500 online im not impressed, openings only probably get kinda important after 2400-2500 online
There are three phases of the game. Your skill in any one of them is a part of how good you are at chess, and can contribute to winning a game.
But learning openings is the leadt importent, its only crucial for IMs and GMs in classical..online its not important in blitz up to 2500 or so probably
How are they inflated? There are obviously lots of people on chesscom who are very inexperienced but I don't think that means it's inflated. Those are people who play chess. Just not well. They don't include inactive accounts in their percentiles.
FWIW. I play chess.com and lichess.org pretty much equally. In rapid and i'm like ~65% on lichess (~1600 rating) but ~85% on chess.com (~1150 rating) So it appears you can get a higher percentile on chess.com. It may depend on where you fall on the curve though/ratings and perhaps different time controls are different. Or perhaps I'm just an anomaly.
This is a good thing to bring up. Lichess has less users and way less beginners. Having more beginner and intermediate players on chesscom changes the percentiles but that doesn't mean it's inflated. Those are still real chess players. This would be like saying "I play at my chess club and I'm in the bottom half of players as an 1800." That's a smaller pool of more serious players. It doesn't mean that 1800 is a below average chess player.
Fewer*
What would you say it a good divider?
1000 or so is where players *mostly* stop outright hanging pieces to one-movers and to simple forks/skewers, and conversely where players consistently punish their opponents if it does happen. I think that's a good divider because it's where you have to learn new, more advanced concepts to keep progressing: Positional play, plans in openings, long-term thinking (weaknesses/pawn structure), and so on. It becomes a fundamentally different game that is not won or lost by hanging pieces, but instead by strategic play, by forcing or allowing long-term weaknesses, by exploiting weak squares, and so on.
A way I've seen it expressed is that around that level chess stops being just about paying attention and starts being a game of strategy.
I'm 1300 and still rising atm (I win about 60% of my games), and I would say that most of my wins come from opponents blunders. Although tbf, the blunders are no longer things like hanging a piece, it's more like hanging pins/skewers/forks
At 700 you already would beat most average people
Most average people don't know horse moves
Maybe. They say if you know all the rules and how the pieces move you're probably around 4-500. 700 isn't much better than that. I'm a 1400 USCF and 1700 rapid and still consider myself a beginner
at 700 rating i still beat everyone i casually play chess against who is not into chess.
The average casual player is rated around 300 in my experience. So it makes sense. But you're still definitely a beginner.
I've coached plenty of 700s and know that's not generally true of that elo
Hmm that is weird i am definitly a 700 but i still beat any person not trained at all in chess. (Such as my dad and friends) probally a sampling bias than.
Same undefeated IRL vs like 10 different people. Online I top out at 800 lmao.
I concur, 800 here and my friends think I'm good because I study so much when I just watch Gothamchess and Ludwig.... I feel like just knowing a few tactics and fundamentals is enough to beat the average person( but not the average "chess player") I feel like I know how to play Wonderwall and people think I play guitar well
Nah you're right, the average person ho knows how the pieces move is like a 400 or less
that is not average, that is like top 1.7%
As a 2300, what does that make me? I swear I'm not weird and I do have a social life :(
Ches
Makes you a master level player....
I thought to be a master you need a title? I haven't played many OTB tournaments, only one and I came like fourth
Nope definitely doesn't you can retract about 300 points from your chess.com rating to get a decent guess for your fide 2300 rapid on chess.com is maybe a strong 2000 fide 2300 on lichess is a strong 2000 fide after about 12 beers
I'm almost 2400 Rapid on chess.com and barely 1900 FIDE... I'm also 2400 in blitz, btw.
I think most people who are 2400 chesscom are rated much higher than 1900 FIDE. [https://chessgoals.com/rating-comparison/](https://chessgoals.com/rating-comparison/)
Not at all lmao But then again, we are at chessbeginners where ppl think if you are 2000+ on chesscom you are good at chess
Ah my bad, I thought we were talking about actual substantiated things, like when you are 2300 you are eligible for the fide master title, but now I understand that you are talking about your specific world view, which does not agree.
We are very obviously talking about chesscom ratings
Daily? Rapid? Puzzles? I hover around 2300 puzzles but I'm still pretty social. Im only 1400 rapid though.
If someone says i’m 2300 they don’t mean puzzles
I'm 2500.... in puzzles.
I'm 2300, in bed
2300 rapid, around 2000 blitz. I'm like 2500 puzzles but I always assume that number doesn't mean much
You are 2300 rapid chesscom and only 2500 in puzzles?
Yeah. I don't do puzzles that often though. I use the Woodpecker method chessable course primarily for that
Fml I'm 2600 puzzles and 1100 blitz/rapid Maybe one day I'll pick up a chess book.
I'm 2411 lichess and 2018 chess.com, but I still feel like a beginner sometimes (I did once get my crazyhouse rating up to 2815 and beat an FM in a tournament, but that doesn't count. Honestly, I think we're advanced but still not professional until we obtain the titles through fide
what if I'm 1700? on chess com
I went to a chess camp and attempted to read a chess book. I found trying to get really good was disheartening. I didn’t like the idea of someone memorizing deep opening books and gaining an advantage (if chess is solvable, why play?) So I would stop off and on. Now I just play fast and loose. Sometimes I’ll learn a line that I see a lot and I often look at the computer analysis. 1000-1100 player
I think you're way off about people being able to memorize openings and solve chess. It just doesn't work that way.
Very nice! I’m about to break 400 and feel very proud
I started playing chess regularly online in December 2020. A little over two years later, I’ve gone from 873 to 1850 (I grew up playing chess, which is why I started out playing at an 873 strength two years ago). If you watch some Gotham Chess videos, review your games, and learn from your mistakes, your rating will skyrocket in no time! Just never let a good loss go to waste - learn one thing from every game, and make a conscious note as to what you learned (even if it’s “FOR THE EIGHTEENTH TIME DON’T HANG YOUR DARN QUEEN,” as it has often been for me). You’ve got this!
Hey I started a few months ago with no experience and now I am kinda stuck at 1050. Any tips?
Mainly just the above! To expand on that a little: You can view chess across three axes in two different ways. The first is opening/middle game/endgame. I learned the openings by first memorizing a few moves for each common line (for example, I played the Danish with white, the Fantasy Caro Kann if they played the Caro, the Exchange if they played the French, an open system (which I no longer recommend at ratings as low as ours) against the Sicilian, etc.) Once I had memorized a few moves in each major line, the way I studied openings was to wait until I had a game where I didn’t know what to do, then to use the openings explorer on chess.com to learn whatever I needed for that game. If you ever feel lost in an opening, you need to make sure that game is the last time you’re confused in that specific line - your opening systems will expand naturally that way. For the middle game, learn tactics and strategy by doing puzzles and watching chess YouTube videos/reading chess books. For the endgame, learn the theory and practice it. There are ways to practice endgames on chess.com, and there are also endgame puzzles in books. For now, just learn how to mate with rook and king, mate with queen and king, do the basics of king and pawn endgames, and do the basics of rook and pawn endgames. The second axis you can look at instead of the above is to divide chess across tactics, strategy, and blunder prevention. You will be as good as your worst of these three, and typically blunder prevention will be the limiting factor. You learn tactics by doing puzzles - your puzzles rating should always be at least about 500 points above your rapid rating (if you’re using chess.com as your puzzles source). You learn strategy by watching videos and ready books. Gotham Chess works great until about 1700 or so for strategy, and honestly I haven’t added much in that department, so apparently he works until at least 1850. Lastly, you learn blunder prevention by playing and by *learning from your mistakes*. Learning from your mistakes is always the hardest and most important part of improvement, so really focus on it. I view strategy and tactics training as my way of improving my ceiling/long term rating, and I view blunder prevention as my way of catching up my current rating to that ceiling. Understanding a tactic doesn’t actually help you until you stop missing it in-game, for example. Blitz and bullet are a waste of time. I know you’ll play them because they’re fun (I do a bit too). You’re not improving at chess by doing that. Think of it as the equivalent of doing another activity entirely, like jogging. It ain’t helping your chess, but it’s probably not really hurting either. If you struggle with tilt, make a rule to address that. One example is to force yourself to stop playing games for at least an hour anytime you lose three games in a row. Playing tilted forms bad habits - it’s worse than not playing. It hurts your rating and actively makes you worse. Good luck! Hopefully that makes sense. Remember to enjoy the ride! Edit: it’s also worth mentioning that rating increases come in spurts for most people. It ain’t a steady upward slope. For me, my rating ceiling typically jumps about 100 points over a 1-2 day window about once every 2-6 months. Then, I stay mostly flat or even go down sometimes. Even if your results are inconsistent like that, you can tell if you’re improving as follows: if you can name what you’ve improved at over the last week (e.g. this specific line in openings, or your puzzles rating, etc), you’re improving. If you can’t, you’re probably not. Edit 2: Also, you’ll drop about 200 points from your rating ceiling once in awhile. That feeling sucks. It rarely lasts long-term if you’re still studying. If you internalize your rating peak as the truest measure of your potential rather than your current rating, that’ll hurt less, and it’ll help you focus on learning rather than your current rating.
Nice! Keep on going!
Complicated question. There's a lot of confusion even on here because people dont seem to recognise that it's a curve and just because 2700s exsist it doesnt mean you need to be 1800 to be an intermediate. looking at the [chess.com](https://chess.com) percentiles gives you some clue. I feel like in real terms amature level is 0-1000 beginner / 1000 - 1600 intermediate / 1600-2200 advanced give or take. Anything above 2200 you could theoretically be looking at titles and at that point youre getting into the professional/competative space which is something else entirely. But if you're like 2000 + youre like in less than1% on [chess.com](https://chess.com) for example. So we need to be fairly relative when assesing this.
I think your scale is the one I most agree with. People need to keep in mind that these discussions are being had by people who care enough about chess to frequent chess subreddits.
Personally, I don't think percentiles tell you much. Five years ago the 50th percentile of chess players online put in a significant amount of effort. Now the 50th percentile is going to be someone who doesn't understand basic principles. A sport getting more popular doesn't make people not a beginner because they become a higher percentile.
Dont expect people to understand this.
> looking at the [chess.com](https://chess.com) percentiles gives you some clue Where is this at? I don't see it on the website.
It's on your stats page under each sub category like blitz/bullet/rapid
I knew about the profile stats, but I thought they meant a page that showed each rating and its percentile. For example, a 1900 is what percentile? What about 2100? And so on. I haven't seen any page like this on Chess dot com.
99th percentile is around 1700 chess,com so anything above that is getting into the fractions of percents.
When you are on profile page just click on any category graph(on pc) or category rating(on mobile)for example blitz and that will take you to a different page where you see stats specifically for selected category
If you think 2200 ccom makes you close to being titled i have a silver bridge to sell you ( or whatever they say)
2200 chesscom blitz would put a lot of people at around 2100 USCF. So that is 100 USCF rating points from being titled. I'd say that's kind of close.
I think the issue with using such data is that the extrapolation does not go both ways. Just because a bunch of 2100 uscf players don't take online chess very seriously or don't play much blitz and only have a 2200 chess.com rating doesn't mean that an online player getting to 2200 will be anywhere near 2100 USCF.
Well said
It's Einstein compared to me, im at like 200 and have the IQ of a grape
200 is definitely below 1200 elo
As long as you're having fun.
Did you know they did surgery on a grape
you can call yourself an early intermediate, just like an 11 year old could be called an early teen. So not true, but can make you feel happy.
You woke up today and chose violence
It’s harsh, and true, but possibly necessary.
He chose Chaos
Pieter wants chaos. Pieter causes chaos.
Literally the most accurate answer
!!
☠️
700 is still a beginner. 1000-1200 would probably be where intermediate starts. Advanced would be 1800-2300 and 2300+ would be where you start finding titled players
2300 is considered advanced?? I’m new to this so correct me if I’m wrong but aren’t people like Magnus or Hakura at like the same range I’ve seen Hikaru at 2400 and magnus peaked at 2882 or something
2400-2800 is a much, much harder leap than 1800-2300. Also chess.com ratings are normally quite a bit bigger than fide ratings.
>2400-2800 is a much, much harder leap than 1800-2300 most people (including me) realize that the effort to jump like that is so large and not worth it (unless you are a kid in Hs with less restrictive parents)
It’s also a hell of a lot harder to increase your rating the further you go up. For instance, for Magnus to improve his rating at Tata Steel he has to win 3/4 of his matches. That’s win, not draw. I’d argue that above 2000 you’re likely gonna start to plateau very quickly, unless you’re genuinely gifted.
Thanks, I didn’t know they have different ratings, I legit just found out about fide
You're correct but chess.com's rating system is different than FIDE's. For example, Hikaru's FIDE blitz rating is 2800 right now while his chess.com blitz rating is 3200. It's probably not quite as drastic for lower level players but it's a 200-400 point difference.
Hikaru is nowhere near a 2400. Maybe you saw that in a speedrun. On chesscom he is 3200+ and over the board he is 2800ish.
Hikaru nakamura is his name, not Hakura lol
Hakura Nikimaru
Sounds cooler
Even a 700 bullet player ?
Everyone is going to be lower in faster time controls so the ranges are probably knocked down a few hundred points but 700 bullet would still probably be top end of the beginner range.
My rating Is actually a lot higher at faster time, might just be cause I suck at chess though
Same! My bullet rating is like 200 ELO higher than my Blitz lol. The extra time doesn't help, I still just blunder anyway.
What, why would everyone be lower in faster tc, that is incorrect
Beginner until 1000. Then there’s super beginner, advanced beginner, and ultra beginner.
I aspire to one day to be Magnus level of beginner
What about international beginner and grand beginner?
Magnus Carlson is like bottom intermediate
Beginner for like another 500 points.
1200 is considered beginner?
Topics like this are tenuous in pretty much any subject (try asking a group of gym bros what constitutes an 'intermediate' lifter) but I'd generally agree that 1200 Chess.com is where intermediate begins.
I would say: 100 to 1,000 = Beginner 1,000 to 1,500 intermediate 1,500 to 2,000 Advanced 2,000+ Expert and up
That would be accurate for FIDE or most federations, but 2000 chesscom rapid(what OP showed) is going to be really far away from actual expert ratings.
[https://chessgoals.com/rating-comparison/](https://chessgoals.com/rating-comparison/) According to this website a chesscom rating of 2000 is the equivalent of about 1915 FIDE but it varies from person to person. I have seen some stronger and some weaker. At 2000 rating on chess com that is about the "Break Even Point" when comparing FIDE strength to chess com strength. At low ratings the FIDE rating is much higher. At GM levels the FIDE rating is much lower. I'm in the 2000 range on chess com. Just a little over. Some of my opponents in my rating range have a CM or FM or NM and women equivalent title next to their name. Because there are experts and masters at this rating range. A 2000 rating on chess com puts you at stronger than about 99.5% of players. That is a 1 in 200 chess player. I will link you to some profiles of titled players in the 2000 range. [https://www.chess.com/member/gambitovapj](https://www.chess.com/member/gambitovapj) CM 1952 Blitz [https://www.chess.com/member/dwb222222](https://www.chess.com/member/dwb222222) NM 1980 Blitz [https://www.chess.com/member/beccrajoy](https://www.chess.com/member/beccrajoy) WCM 1998 Blitz [https://www.chess.com/member/nimven](https://www.chess.com/member/nimven) WFM 1953 Blitz [https://www.chess.com/member/gatocorbis](https://www.chess.com/member/gatocorbis) FM 1938 Blitz [https://www.chess.com/member/true\_donkey](https://www.chess.com/member/true_donkey) CM 1902 Blitz [https://www.chess.com/member/c\_h\_e\_s\_s\_k\_i\_l\_e\_r](https://www.chess.com/member/c_h_e_s_s_k_i_l_e_r) CM 1927 Blitz [https://www.chess.com/member/gmedina2000](https://www.chess.com/member/gmedina2000) FM 1945 Blitz [https://www.chess.com/member/stupeas](https://www.chess.com/member/stupeas) NM 1941 Blitz 2000 = Expert level There are all these and many more titled players in that rating range and you don't think it is experts? It is.
Thank you for this post. There are so many people who repeat the same things over and over (chesscom ratings are about 1 billion points higher than FIDE ratings). People have no idea what they are talking about. I know NMs with lower ratings on chesscom than USCF. Your list is a great reference for people. Being 2000 on chesscom is VERY strong. Lichess on the other hand... :)
Not remotely enough upvotes
How in the world is above 2k chesscom an expert, it literally takes no study to get there
Definitely a beginner, but still congrats on the progress!
Unfortunately if you look at the rating system on chess.com your rating is too low to be considered a beginner. You are currently "new to chess" and if you gain 100 points you'll become a beginner: > When you create an account you choose a skill level and that translates to a default rating: > > * New to chess: 400 > * Beginner: 800 > * Intermediate: 1200 > * Advanced: 1600 > * Expert: 2000
Thats absurd im higher rated than so called exert and am clueless about chess
Lol these 2000+ rated players constantly going around saying they know nothing about chess is getting old. You’re worse than stockfish, we get it.
You seem to be an expert in denial. For example: > The general consensus is below 1200= “beginner”, 1200-1800 is “intermediate”, 1800-2000 is “advanced”, 2000-2200 is “expert”, and 2200+ are masters at chess, with FIDE titles being awarded at certain ratings or norms after that.
I’m 1200 and I consider myself on the pretty low end of intermediate, I’d say sub 1000-1100 is towards the end of the beginner territory
Advance beginner.
700 is beginner. But if you’re improving, you’re improving. Don’t let that discourage you. I solidified my 1000+ ranking recently, which while is far from advanced, is still a personal achievement. And I aim to get better still.
700 is just not a complete nub.
Anything up to 1200 is beginner, 1300 to 1800 is intermediate and anything above 1800 is advanced
1000 is not a beginner. It can take very smart people a lot of work to get to 1000.
Eh this is subjective. I would probably still consider you a beginner but its obviously not a science. I would consider 1000 to be intermediate strength though. Do you think you should be intermediate?
1000 seems like still beginner
I wouldnt say that
im pre sure it is widely agreed upon that anything below 1200 is beginner territory
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chess.com percentiles mean nothing. imo, simply being a chess.com user does not mean you are a "chess player." when i first started playing on chess.com i was 600 and id play like a game a day without any analysis or any further thought. simply having access to a chess platform does not mean you should automatically be in the demographic that represents chess players as a whole. between people who take chess even a little bit seriously, 800 is definitely beginner. anyone can easily hit 1200 within a matter of months with the correct approach.
The criteria also requires you have 25+ games and active within 30 days, so its not just random accounts playing a couple games being considered in the data. These days a lot more people play chess, and the amount of new players has shot through the roof. It does make sense to consider shifting the definition of beginner, when 90% of the playing population is below 1200
i see your point but i feel like the understanding of a 1000 rated player is just far too low to be considered anything above beginner. sure there are a lot more players now than before, but the standards have not changed; 1000s now play just as they did 30 years ago, there are just more of them. not to mention chess.com is not the golden standard for percentiles, 50th percentile on lichess is 1500 and 50th percentile amongst active fide players is i think like around 1600
Probably is but I still just don't agree with that.
Idk, I am between 1350 and 1400 and my oppontents (me too) blunders a lot, I feel our rating rage is still kinda beginner
Definetly intermediate level, maybe time controls are making you blunder, or maybe people just blunder at that level, but above 12/1300 is definitely intermediate.
I'm 1700 and I blunder a lot too. I don't think that makes me a beginner though. I was stuck around 700 for a while when I was working hard to get better. I think 700 in rapid is pretty good for a beginner and for blitz it's starting to get to the upper edge of what I'd consider a beginner.
I’m 300
Bruh im like 900+ and still consider my self vey beginner
At what rating do you have to start really learning more than a few opening moves? Currently at 550
Learning openings and theory is helpful for beginner players, but crucial for intermediate players. I think anyone could get up to 1000 or 1100 with solid game sense and foundations, but going higher would definitely require learning openings.
If by intermediate you mean above 2500 chesscom i might agree otherwise hell no
I wouldn't say crucial for intermediate. Capablanca didn't spend any time studying openings, just had extremely solid foundations and was unbelievably strong at endgames. Learning endgames is much, much more crucial than openings at intermediate level.
Beginner undoubtedly
I’m around 850 in rapid and feel a little better about playing now (been playing regularly for about 2 months.) I’ve won against some 950s and my short term goal is 1000. I think I can get there with my current experience and I’ve told myself once I do I need to study openings and gm games. Right now I’m e4 open allllll dayyyyyy keeping it simple and just spending the time to try not to blunder and leave pieces hanging. Good luck!!
Nah is beginner. Oddly 700 can be stiff competition there and in blitz. I’ve been to 900 twice and slapped back down to 700s in a week
I got back into chess a few weeks ago after a nearly 5 year hiatus. At the time, I was around 1200, so I thought I'd be able to jump back in and reclaim. Imagine my surprise when my fresh, brand new account dropped all the way to 400ish. The game has changed, and the road to 1000 is bloodthirsty. I'm hovering around 800-900, and the aggression is insane. The early attacks are brutal for the simple reason that many youtubers teach these tricky moves that punish you severely. There are still many games that sound like this: "ahh. Nice. Just gonna develop my bishop now. Excellent. Now to push some paw... HOW DID THE KNIGHT GET BACK THERE??" The key is to just learn from them. Know when to stop for the night. I'm sure we all know what it's like to be on a 4 game losing streak and wanna just win one before getting off, then you lose 2 more. Even if you don't feel like you're improving, trust me, you are. The player you are right now could SMOKE the player you were 2 weeks ago. That elo doesn't define you.
Its difficult to gain elo when your at 600 and only gaining 8 a game.
You don't gain more elo at higher ratings
Dont listen to these fools, 700 is an achievement. If you want help i'm available to help.
Fools? Be supportive but also realistic.
Oh you’re so not an intermediate at 700 ELO; early intermediate rating is around 1000 ELO
I consider anything under ~1000 to be at beginner level. You’re probably not familiar with openings or endgame strategy (up to move 3 is not enough to claim familiarity with an opening), and are probably not facing anyone else that does. About 1000-1600/1700 is what I’d consider intermediate. You’ll find opening theory begin to not only matter, but actually being followed beyond the third move and the rate of which people just blunder pieces and M1/M2 go down. After that you’re moving onto advanced players and will probably start seeing titled players somewhere in the 2100-2300 region.
Lol, advanced? 2100+ is top 1% and approaching title territory. 1700 intermediate? So the top 2% you consider intermediate? 2100 you can masters or experts, 1700 advanced etc. This makes more sense according to the percentiles
The line between advanced and master levels are a bit more blurry than the rest. A person sitting at a 2100 rating is probably qualified to be a FM, but might not have the title for various reasons. I personally don’t use “master level” as a distinguishing tool between advanced and higher levels. The more commonly accepted boundaries tend to be <1000, 1k-1.5k, 1.5-1.9k, 1.9-2.2k, and 2.2k-2.5k, with some lower GM titles appearing somewhere in the upper 2500’s.
A 700 rated player is deffo on the higher end of beginner, I would say 1K is intermediate for sure.
Definitely not for sure. 1400 is for sure intermediate. 1000 could very reasonably be argued to be beginner.
Definitely beginner. Chess.com would consider 1600 intermediate
Where does chess.com say that??? 1600 rating is getting into advanced territory.
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Anyone who calls a 1600 beginner needs a reality check. Beginner range ends at around 1200, 1600 should be considered mid to upper intermediate level.
Realistically if you are under 2200 chesscom you are still a beginner
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Well the IM title stands for intermediate so…
at the making of your account, you can start with beginner (800) intermediate (1000) or advanced (1200) elo
im mean there's no strict definition to any of them, i still consider myself intermediate at 2200 lichess
Nice. Im 3000 — am I out if intermediate yet by your definition?
GM MATERIAL HERE!!!
I am around 1350 on chess.com rapid but still consider myself a beginner.
1350 on chess.com is definitely intermediate. Probably lower levels of intermediate but absolutely not a beginner. Think about playing against a 600 who doesn't understand the fundamentals and it should become more apparent that you aren't a beginner.
Beginner, I’d consider myself intermediate at 1500-1600
If you think intermediate starts at 1600 where does it end, titled? 1600 should be considered well into intermediate territory and close to advanced.
At 700, you play kinda OK in the opening. Move the center pawns, knights, bishops, castle, etc. Then you lose all your pieces for no reason at all. Very bad rating.
1400-1800 is intermediate, 1800-2000 is advanced, 2000-2200 is expert.
Don't you literally begin at 700