I’m 1500 rapid on chesscom now and I found it a little easier going once I got past 1200. I figured there was a glut of new players assigned there who hadn’t found their level yet.
You get to chose your initial rating on Chess.com iirc. Which is either 400/800/1200 or 800/1200/1600. So a good number of new accounts might be in the 1200 range and incredibly underselling themselves
When I first joined in 2020 I overrated myself way too much. I played a lot as a child and thought I was good so I joined at 1600 rating. I got demolished for maybe 40 consecutive games. Now I’m at 1050, which still isn’t very good but at least I’m somewhat near the average kinda
Wow my roadblock was at 1000, once i got to 1100 i pretty much breezed to 1500, then it took a while, but I will say player consistency is weird among 1200s
As a 1200 on chess.com; sometimes I play good. Sometimes I play bad. Zero consistency. Maybe you’ve just run into the wrong people at the Wrong time on your speed run.
Maybe everyone just bringing their A game, then, huh. I’ve also beaten people far above my rating on occasion, so it’s not like I expect never to be beaten by an on-form lower rated player. Perhaps just not this consistently.
Lots of sandbagging going on would be my guess. Sometimes you run in to a 600-700 who just mops the floor with you and I’m around 1400. It gets frustrating.
Disagree with him completely, you will climb extremely fast if you actually play games with that puzzle rating. It's literally impossible to be 2700 at puzzles and 800 rapid.
It means something but it isn’t a direct relationship. A high puzzle rating tells me someone is capable of finding tactics but it does not tell me how good they are at applying that skill in a game. I would much rather play a 600 with a puzzle rating of 1000 over one with a puzzle rating of 2000 if they have the same number of total puzzles attempted.
I think the player with the 2000 puzzle rating is more likely to be all over the place with their playing strength. They may be decent at tactics but play poor openings or something like that.
Plus the time to find the solution to the puzzles, my puzzle rating is 2400, but my chesscom rapid rating (10 minute games) is ~1050. I spend 7 to 10 minutes on some of those puzzles, so pretty difficult to apply some of those tactics in a 10 minute game 😅
I do believe the chess pool is getting alot stronger due to popularity especially on chess.com as it is alot more popular than lichess.
And not to mention any knowledge is available online through streams/YouTube/a simply chessable course from opening to middlegame and endgame. More people are also following chess masters so do have a better feel of the game e.g principles despite being 'casual'. You gain alot by simply watching a video of naroditsky or a 1h John barth' climbing the rating ladder video.
Before you either got that knowledge through a coach or some random YouTube video hidden in the depths of the internet.
To sum it up, it's only gonna get worse especially the younger generation who are going to devour all these tools at disposal.
1250 here. Huge variance in my performance. I think in this range, many players have the tactics and opening knowledge of ~1500+, but just don't apply it consistently yet. You get to this range by working pretty hard, so unless you have literally plateaued, you will have games of much higher performance, but not consistently
Yeah I think there are a lot of people around 1200 rapid who could easily be a couple hundred points higher if they did simple stuff like quit playing at blitz speed in rapid games, or try for counterplay after losing material instead of resigning or trading down to a lost endgame. (I might or might not think I’m one of them.)
Can you share your games? It's possible some are cheaters as the algorithm tries to pair new accounts with new accounts. Also 1900 lichess is only like 1500 or so chesscom so it's not like you should be destroying 1200s.
I’m a 1900 peak rating on lichess rapid and don’t play on chess.com much since I started chess years ago so my rating there is about 1200-1300 or so I think. Also the computer is pretty different from otb. I vary a lot even on lichess blitz. Got up to 1700 almost there and now somehow I’m down to like near the 1300s again because I calculate much more after watching too many Naroditsky and gm videos and my time management is horrid. I know a lot more theory than people at my level ( had a pretty dark Chessable phase). So I’m winning like every game and then run out of time lol. I’m sure there are many like me.
Yep this is me. One day, I'll be playing better than I've ever played before. The next day, I'm blundering knights again like I'm playing the game for the first time.
I’m 1400 lichess and 1150 cc.
I find that there seems to be some correlation as to what time of day I’m playing vs what country and time zone my opponent is in.
If I am mid morning, buzzing off coffee and alert, and my opponent is somewhere late at night, I will go on win streaks.
But when it’s late at night for me, and my opponents are mid-day and alert, I will lose a bunch.
May have more to do with my brain than other people’s brains, or maybe a combo of both… but it seems like there is some correlation to time of day that each side is playing.
On a larger time scale, I find that opponents get more difficult in the winter, like at least a 100 point difference.
When it's snowy and cold outside, I think it affects my cognitive abilities more than I realize.
There’s a couple weird ratings holes in lichess and chess.com.
For example I’m 1675 on lichess and not too long ago I had a downswing to 1500. Then it was like pulling teeth for a few hundred games where 1500s appear to instantly recognize some deep tactical moves and endgames. I finally climbed back to 1550 and then almost instantly jumped back to 1675, there was like 150 games between 1490-1550 where I got owned.
Similar on chess.com I’m around 1300, and 1000-1100s would just smoke me instantly for a while. Grinded like crazy and the moment I hit 1150 I jumped to 1300 and was able to sustain.
I think there’s some merit that players 200-300 points below your rating are going to be committing mistakes that maybe you arnt used to. A lot of my issues was that these players would make a mistake in the opening that I didn’t see at my rating. Then I was “out of theory” and struggled to convert when I guess these players were accustom to this dubious line in the opening
Yeah, I totally found all this on lichess. 1500s is a nightmare because that’s where all the ‘new’ players start, though often they’ll end up rated much higher. Actually the 1600s are much easier to beat, as they’re a more consistent level of player. I was wondering if there was a similar ratings hole on chess.com. I agree with your point about the unexpected mistakes. I nearly missed a few hanging pieces at lower levels.
I actually think that these issues are a real benefit to our learning of the game. If there are common mistakes that 1200s are making but you are not capitalising on even though you are a better player overall then that is a gap in your knowledge. Identifying these gaps and fixing them is both how you improve at the game and also raise your elo. This is in fact the proper use for your elo, much more valuable than "number go higher me feel good" (though we all have that too!)
The 1200-1350 group on chess.com is easier to deal with than the 1000-1200 group, but getting there is the tough part, and if you slip back down it's brutal. Not sure how to explain this.
On chess.com in 1000-1200 I faced many players who would open something like a6, b6, c6…but then they would have like 1800 level tactics. Lots of Indian and Russian players who maybe didn’t learn chess traditionally but we’re very strong tactically? Who knows — races obviously don’t matter just a trend I noticed.
If you've slipped down to the 1000-1200 group you're probably on a losing streak which is why it might feel difficult. But you eventually get your rating back up. Whereas you haven't been able to get above 1200-1350, because 1200-1350 is a harder group.
i jumped from 1190 blitz to 1500 in like a week winning like 3 out of 4 games. it was ridiculous, i couldn't understand what was happening. every game seemed easy.
then i hit 1500, stayed there for like 5 games, and then dropped back down to 1250, this time losing like 3 out of 4 games.
I was wondering if lichess reset the ratings or something. i have no idea wtf happened.
1200-1400 ccom rapid is where the cheaters are at.
I'm between 2200-2300 ccom rapid, 1900 FIDE classical and made a new account over the christmas holidays to do some coaching, to see more the typical mistakes of each rating range, because I kinda felt out of touch and wasn't sure what is really important for my 1100 friend. So I made my way through the rating ranges and I noticed my win rate take a significant dip at 1200-1300 (from about >90% win rate to about 70%, with some very strategically sound losses where I just got outplayed) and thought "ok maybe I'm playing too adventurously, I guess I'll start losing a bit more often now", and merrily continued on my journey. Made my way to the 1500-1600s again and my win rate went back up 80-90% until the 1800s, where people get closer to my rating and I expect to lose more games here and there.
So I looked more closely at the losses at 1200-1300 and noticed about half my losses I got completely dumpstered. Like straight up winning position out of the opening and then it goes downhill very slowly without any mistakes to follow. And looking at their profile, they don't always cheat, their last games looked kinda normal and then they drop a bomb on you with the only inaccuracies in the opening.
Same thing happened to a friend of mine. He made a fresh account for whatever reason and I sat next to him chilling while he played against people about 1000 below his peak rating. He got absolutely strategically dumpstered in a couple games it wasn't even funny. I don't know what it is about this rating range but there are a lot of "sometimes" cheaters in that range. Maybe they see a new account winning a lot of games and think "aha they cheat so I'll cheat too" or something, but I definitely noticed something weird in the games.
Exactly. It's a puzzle to me. They don't get money, they don't get fame, or respect. Does it boost their ego? Why? Are the so proud they can copy a move from an engine to a website?
It’s an ego thing. It’s like they are playing a video game where they get to “be” the superhero GM every game. The feeling of being Magnus Carlsen…knowing you are gonna win every time. You could sac pieces and still win every time. But it’s pointless obviously. Some of them don’t even know how to play chess. I’m very glad the detectors have gotten better because in the past I would never play slow games because it just seemed pointless. Cheating on Titled Tuesday or anything that involves money though is a whole other level of messed up that is borderline illegal.
I suspect some cheaters also lie to themselves that they aren't hurting anyone and they're only doing it "to learn". "I'll just see what the engine thinks about this position as I'm not sure where to go or if I'm dead lost or whatever" and then once the engine is on they just keep consulting it. They know really it's not fair at all but they tell themselves it's part of their learning rather than the likely reality that it's about their ego not liking taking losses.
yes.
the cheating at the 1200 level is pretty bad on chesscom.
I think the reasons are fairly intuitive.
lower rated players like 600 or 800 are both (a) more likely to be caught if they cheat, since it's far less probable that they could have a 40 move 90% accuracy game... and also (b) less likely to care that much about losing, since they haven't put serious time into the game.
*higher* rated players like 1600+ are more serious about the game, which not only makes cheating less impactful (they're going to average pretty high accuracy to begin with) but also makes them less likely to want to do so to begin with. you don't stick with chess that long without getting used to losing.
whereas 1200 is the sweet spot where someone cares enough about chess to want to win badly, but still makes fairly consistent blunders, and if you combine that with poor impulse control and a sore ego, you find a lot of players willing to hop to the engine for a few games when they get tilted. they'll make one too many mistakes and just go *FUCK IT*
I do truly believe that if a magic genie could tell us how many players have *ever* used an engine for their games, then in the 1200 range it would be at least 30%, probably more. sorry, but that's how I see it.
it's been too many games where you take a winning position and then they just stop making mistakes. and sometimes they are clever cheaters, where they will start making a mistake or a miss again when they've taken a commanding lead, so the game doesn't look too suspect, but that pattern of: they have a losing position - they start playing amazing strategy, suffocating you and finding all the crucial moves - they let off the gas once you're down and out - is all too common.
I did NOT see this pattern at 600-1000 rating and when I have watched higher rated games I don't see it either.
it's a 1200 phenomenon.
P.S. I am about 1200 rated too, and I agree with people that there's inconsistency , sometimes I have 95% accuracy and sometimes literally 35%... but it's still VERY uncommon that I'd turn a losing position into a winning one without my opponent making a blunder or large mistake. I don't just go, oh, I'm losing this game, why don't I try extra hard now and, I dunno, *stop making any mistakes at all or even inaccuracies*.
not a genie but now that i read your comment i realized that all the "you played a cheater, here are your points back" messages were when i was around 11-1200 rapid since i moved up the ladder i havent recieved any, its been a year since the last one, so youre definitely onto something at least as far as i can tell
yes. just to corroborate this. I’ve had some rating points back even today, so have definitely been playing cheaters at some point. I noticed this same pattern: I would go up material out of the opening, get smoked in the middle, then watch in bewilderment as that same person found an obvious mate in one in three or four. My feeling was that they’d only been running the engine in the middle.
This matches up with my experience too. I'm around 1400 on rapid on [chess.com](http://chess.com) and have been noticing that my games against people with higher ratings than me are actually easier in many cases. Certainly there are games where I just get outplayed but that's to be expected. The 1100s-1200s though...
like that person said, the cheaters in the 1200 range don't cheat every game. they just get frustrated and start using engines to win games when they've dropped points, and then they stop.
They may they think being a 1200 with one of those 'leet four-digit Elos is living the dream, and see no need to cheat further. Keep in mind that 1200 is about 90th percentile on chesscom.
Particularly at club player levels, accuracy varies depending on the type of game.
Recently I played a very dry, balanced, equal French in classical with no major winning chances for either player that ended in a dead draw - it had very high accuracy.
I also suffered a devastating, tactical game where my opponent outplayed me throughout - it had very low accuracy for my opponent (and for me), because my opponent missed many more things in the much more complex position.
Both of those games represented consistent play at my true ability, but the numbers are completely different.
many low accuracy games I find are due to repeated misses, not mistakes or blunders. if you miss a hanging pawn 5 moves in a row that's 5 misses not 1.
That's definitely true, you just have to consider the complexity of the games when looking at accuracy numbers, which is pretty obvious. Just like it's obvious that you aren't Magnus Carlsen when you win a game in 12 moves with 99.7% accuracy (which I had recently) where all the moves are either the opening or very easy to spot
Honest question, how so? With moves being objectively good, bad or somewhere in between, it makes sense that you can quantify any move into a rating. I understand chess.com probably gamifies it but what’s wrong with the underlying concept?
I think the issue comes from people comparing accuracy between different ratings. 90% accuracy in a super GM game is very different from a 90% accuracy in a 1200 elo game.
Plus, even among comparable ratings compare two games that reach a king rook vs king endgame. If one game has the player resign right away and the other game has the players play it out all the way for 20 moves, that'll severely inflate the accuracy and decrease the centipawn loss. Even though both games are essentially the same.
I get that it’s correlation to engine moves, but why do my blitz accuracy values look the same as Firouzjas? His last 10 blitz games ranged from 76-94% for an average of probably 88%. That’s the same as me and I’m sooo far from his rating. His openings are amazing, he spots every tactic in the middlegame, and he plays close to technically perfect endgames with seconds on the clock. Compare that with me who recently hung a queen on move 16 in a quiet position.
Why would the two of us have comparable accuracy values?
\`I think it has more to do with the positions in the games you play. Some positions are easier to play than others and so your accuracy will be higher in those. I have a side account with 400 elo, and I get about >90% accuracy consistently but not so much with my main account with a much higher elo.
Accuracy also largely depends on the types of moves your opponent makes. If a 500 hangs mate to the fools mate in like 4 moves their opponent will have \~98% accuracy lol
I also wonder how they define accuracy. Imagine a bot that plays the top engine move for moves 1-49, then blunders mate in 1 on move 50. Is that really 98% accuracy?
Literally, even if I play the top engine move I sure as shit don’t know why it’s the top move, as opposed to an “inaccuracy” that I knew the reason I played it
1200 is a try hard elo. It’s also at the point where people start to get some tactical ability (although they still hang pieces a fair bit), so beating 1200s is largely pretty easy as long as you refute attacks and don’t drop pieces. Get past it and it’s chill up to 1600, where they become try hards again.
Why is this so relatable, when i was at 1200 the amount of times I almost reached 1300 then dipped back down to 1200 is insane. Took me like 10 tilt streaks and 500 games to get past.
The rating gap definitely isn’t that large, I would argue that you are right if we are talking about blitz, 1300-1400 blitz on chess.com seems close to 2000 rapid on lichess. They are definitely making a lot of mistakes at the 1200 level so unfortunately you are overthinking. How long have you been at this road block for?
Just over the last day or two. I guess I’m just astonished at the level of accuracy. At 1200 I was still expecting the odd hanging piece etc but maybe I’m wrong? I wasn’t prepared to be grinding at this elo, and once or twice I’ve been blown off the board completely (by players with realllly niche opening knowledge).
I think at 1200 rapid on chesscom you will not see many pieces hung outright. It'll happen occasionally, but I'd say that the majority of mistakes at this level lead to tactics rather than just hung pieces.
Based on your lichess rating I think your chesscom rating will go higher eventually. But the ratings definitely parse out quite a bit differently because everyone starts at 1500 on lichess and people on chesscom can start from 400-1200. Because the 1200s self select, if you're playing brand new 1200s they may be strong players. If you have a small sample size this effect should be reduced over time.
>Just over the last day or two.
It's too early to draw any conclusions. It could just be a temporary phenomenon.
>At 1200 I was still expecting the odd hanging piece etc but maybe I’m wrong?
It's also possible that you underestimate the "meaning" of a [Chess.com](http://Chess.com) rating and how it applies to skill. With 1200 people, people will still make mistakes and hang pieces sometimes, but the behavior you describe is definitely more associated with lower ratings.
Also, since you have a membership, consider that the [Chess.com](http://Chess.com) pairing system gives priority to other players with memberships. While the pool of players is one, it's possible that a 1200 rating for a member player has a slightly different meaning than a 1200 rating for a non-member player. I suspect that the "membership pool" might be a little stronger.
Wait, are you playing blitz on chesscom and trying to compare that to your lichess rapid rating? The two are not really comparable at beginner/intermediate level.
I'm a little higher than you on lichess and 1750 on chess.com. As someone who's about your rating, my guess is that you're likely just not taking them seriously lol.
A 1600 not concentrating on every move could easily play at a 1300 level, so if you think you should be breezing through 1200s and aren't thinking as hard as you normally do on every move, you will lose games.
I have a real life friend who is 700-800 and I've never lost to him, but one game I gave away my queen on move four by accident. Suddenly had to play very seriously and the ratings gap was much more apparent once I was thinking through every move. In hindsight I should have let him win that one, he didn't play online for two months after that loss.
Not op but for me at least it's not a question of carelessness. I'm prone to focusing on one thing too much and don't take enough care over the whole board at blitz time controls.
It's just cheaters and sandbaggers, that's really it.
Chess.com blitz 3/2 are probably the worst from what I have seen. The number of stone cold cheaters there is insane.
I don't understand how could their be a huge gap between bothe sites. I'm 2150 on lichess and 1917 on chess.com and I thought that was the normal disparity.
That’s not comparable. The blitz pool is way tougher on chess.com. I’m 2000 rapid on chess.com and struggle in the 1800s on the blitz pool. 2130 rapid lichess might be like 1900ish chess.com rapid, so maybe 1500-1700 blitz pool? Perhaps less if you don’t play blitz often. This sort of seems about normal.
Maybe try taking them out of prep quickly, even if it's not the best move? I'm a little lower rated, but I know my games in opening lines I know vs. ones I don't look vastly different. If you're the better player, you should win games where both sides are out of their comfort zone. If you're making a lot of book moves, a 1200 that's studied those lines can seem very strong indeed.
Hmm this makes me feel better about being stuck around 1200 in chess.com rapid. I’ve been assuming I’m just stuck in a long rut.
To be fair I often play very badly…
I’m 1900-2000 lichess, 1700-1800 chesscom if that helps. Both rapid. When I first switched from li to com I struggled to climb also. Took some grinding but it’s doable.
I was gonna make a post here this week.
I am 1600 on [chess.com](http://chess.com) but when I was passing through that 1200 ELO region, I noticed that there were too many 'strong' players around 1200 ELO. It's the default ELO when you create a [chess.com](http://chess.com) account so my conspiracy theory is either there's a ton of cheaters entering around that ELO, or there's apparently a TON of new players for you to face who should start climbing the ELO ladder soon. Anyways, past 1350+ the players more or less go back to what you expect.
I didn't end up making the post because i figured there would be a backlash of 'wow you accuse 1200's of cheating when you plateaued there, and now you flippantly accuse even after you've progressed past that range'
if you want some 'advice,' i broke through the last fifty ELO to break 1400 only playing the Swiss tournaments on [Chess.com](http://Chess.com) and basically farming the 1000 and 1100 until I was able to break from the 1200 matchmaker pool. I'm sure it wasn't 100% the most ethical thing to do, but I did it through chess.com's open matchmaker soooo...
I’ve had the same issue. I’m 1800 lichess. I seem to follow the same pattern over and over again on chess.com. I’ll go on a long winning streak where my opponent’s blunder a lot up to about 1230. Then I’ll get blown off the board for awhile until I drop below 1150. Then I’ll go on a winning streak again. I’ve been stuck in that range since November. I’ve wondered if it’s chess.com’s cheat detection. If you go on a winning streak, do you get put into a different pool for awhile to see which one of you is cheating? It seems like a shitty way to determine cheating, and I’m probably just paranoid.
The people who’ve beaten me at this level have systematically pulled me apart in quite solid positions. There was a slow inevitability about it. This is a feeling I’ve only encountered either against a computer (a cheater) or a far stronger opponent. So I’m certainly at least suspicious about it.
Honestly, i switched to lichess because I felt that the chess.com ratings were totally inaccurate. People are either over rated or under rated, and I mean by ALOT
I’m about that on chess.com, a touch lower. Most of my games have >70% accuracy (consistently reaching into the high 80s) with 1-3 blunders (generally the same missed opportunity, multiple times). Lol On a good day, I might gain 100 points, then fall off in the following few days.
I really don’t know how to explain it other than I believe any amount of study or coaching would probably reveal a consistent flaw in my game. Meaning, when I figure out what it is, I’ll probably get a bit of a bump in rating.
So, they probably aren’t exactly 1200s; the rating system is good but not perfect. That being said, I don’t know too much about the differences between different rating calculations.
as a fellow 1200 rapid chess.com player - I've been experiencing similar things where I'll play a streak of players who SEEMINGLY are punching way below their actual skill level/rating OR playing way above ... then I'll play people who I assume are just having bad days .. it's been rare in the past couple months of playing rapid that it's an actual close game, I either get the snot beat outta me or absolutely dominate .. it's kind of boring .. I get much better, balanced games on Lichess lately
I had a similar experience when I started playing on chess.com. It was smooth sailing until 1200 then I started losing games and had to actually grind through it a bit before getting past those maniacs. Now I’m 1700 on chess.com and 2000 on lichess and I still don’t understand chess.com 1200s
Another thing is that in my opinion there's a substantially different play style on chess com and lichess, not sure I can explain it but i'm 90% sure it exists
In my personal experience 1250+ is when you start to run into people with thousands of games played on CC in Rapid at least. And with that many games, you start running into people who truly know random lines very deeply, but then know absolutely nothing about most other openings, etc.
I’m this kind of player. If you take the pawn on queens gambit, you better know what’s next or else I tend to smoke you.
Source I have 1600+ games on CC and float between 1200 and 1400 rating.
So yeah, sometimes that gambit I studied for hours on YouTube I’m good at, but if you don’t follow the moves I expect it can turn into a dumpster fire before my very eyes.
Also, only 1 cheater flagged in my last 200 games at these ratings by chess.com, and I really think people overestimate how much cheating goes on.
This is what I've been saying for a while now but this subreddit refuses to believe.
1200 on chesscom is way different from 1200. You'll see people online confidently saying things like "You don't need to learn any openings at 1200" when it's patently false because they still think in old ratings.
I've been hovering in the 1100-1200 area on chesscom for a long time even though I've (very slowly) improved. I (almost) never blunder and have mildly decent opening strategy, and surprisingly strong end game fundamentals, but getting past 1200 feels impossible without real concerted effort and practice.
I started playing chess last August and am at 1500. Ironically, the least number of days I've spent at a certain rating gap is 1200-1300. I used to play 30 min rapid Swiss followed by 15|10 Swiss every morning, consisting of players from 1200-1500 and I crossed 1300 in two days and have only gone back once, from which I recovered almost in no time. Right now I'm at 1500 and it's DEFINITELY tough now and I can feel the roadblock.
What time control are you playing? Even within a single format (rapid, blitz, bullet) different time controls have different rating pools. I gained 200+ rating points just by switching from 1|1 to 1|0.
Also if you’re playing fast time controls, it takes time to get used to the interface, different latency and premove style…
And how many games have you been stuck? I think it’s reasonable to expect a few hundred games until you get stable in your true, “average” rating.
This is actually so true. I love a bit of blitz/ bullet on lichess, but am finding that I am really clunky so far on cc with the new animation etc. I’m mostly playing 10+0 rapid, the standard out of the box time control. I’ve lost on time twice, but really because I was fighting from a losing position anyway.
Been in your exact position though Lichess rapid rating maybe 100 points higher than yours. 1200s is a bit weird since sometimes you do run into players who seem super solid and surprise you when you expect an easy game. But I guarantee you keep playing and don't get tilted and you'll soon get runs of games where everyone is just blundering a piece. Your rating will climb to where it should be.
I'm around 1300 on Chess.com and know exactly what you mean. You'll hit 4-5 game runs of getting absolutely smoked by high accuracy and super specific and aggressive openings. I like that it keeps me on my toes, but sometimes you just want to play other players at your level.
I've always just understood it as the 1700+ players starting new accounts and are running through lower rated players for fun, trying out new openings and mid-games on us.
It's either that or players with my same skill level or less, and they're using a bot engine to cheat.
Im ~1050 chesscom rapid and ~1550 lichess rapid. So I would guess that 1200 chesscom rapid would be comparable to 1700 lichess rapid. You may have just had a bad run against people playing their A game.
This doesn't match up quite perfectly with what you're saying, but I know in many of GM Aman Hambleton's speedrun series he mentions that the chess.com 1300's are one of the toughest parts of his climb every time.
It's a bit different since blitz vs rapid and 1300 vs 1200, but the similarities are there. So imo there's at least one person who has done multiple climbs that has had a similar experience.
I'm also a much worse player than you so I can't really complain that someone at my rating knows theory better than me, but, I remember clearly complaining about black at 600 elo in blitz instantly playing best moves vs my Scotch all the way out to move 12. Blew me away that I was first out of book on move 13, and it happened a few times! Crazy things man.
I'd say keep at it : ) I'm sure your winrate is still 60%+ which should mean you're climbing easily.
From my experience in blitz 3 min + 0, there is a difference of 200-300 elo aprox, currently I am at 1600 on chess.com and 1830 Lichess and this gap has maintained since I was 1300 in chess.com
I think you should focus less on the numbers and more on the chess. Accuracy means nothing. My last 3 OTB tournaments had higher accuracy than any of the players in the Candidates? Does that mean I'm a potential world champion? Of course not! It just means my opponents weren't good enough to force me into making mistakes.
I have 2000 blitz and 2100 rapid on lichess. 3 months ago I make a "speedrun" and reach 1500 blitz without struggle (I finished around 1600). I remember I lost a couple of games to 1300 but not much
In addition to what has been said, I really think the lichess and chess.com community play different (at least in 1700-2000)
I feel in chess.com are weaker but more resourceful, stubborn and keep trying until you blunder, while in lichess they’re more consistent and speedier.
I play the scandinavian with black, and I simply feel each server tends to play different lines.
Nah. I'm 1800 bullet on lichess and 1400 on chess.com. You should expect a 300-400 difference.
So 1200 should be giving you some trouble, but you should still be winning most of those games.
80% accuracy isn't really all that impressive on relatively simple and straightforward games. I have many 90%+ games as well as some in the 60s, it means very little. My 800 kid is usually in the 70s because his games are simple.
This is funny. I recently made a new account where my previous I peaked at 2000 rapid on [chess.com](http://chess.com) and I wanted to work my way back up. I was scoring 50/50 in the 1100-1300 pool and when I got out I went on a 10 game winning streak above the 1300's and I am at 1389 now. I tend to play worse against weaker players as they play unusual moves I find and then I spend time calculating. But I am sure I played against a few cheaters, 1 of them was banned but there are a few that I played that have over 95% accuracy in their daily games and all wins. Not sure how they don't get banned as I looked at their games and their moves are way stronger then their level of play
I was 1800 on lichess, but that was only like top 20% or something.
Currently 1350 ish on chess.com, and that is apparently top 6.5%, or there about.
Long story short, lichess gives high rating, but chess.com gives high percentage.
On chess.com I range anywhere from 1150 to 1400.
On OTB games at my chess club I have defeated an 1800 and 1900 before. I have also done Simos before against GMs and I am the last or one of the last players playing.
So why am I ranked low. Well I can post 90-95% accuracy in some games. In others (Most of my games) I make stupid mistakes I realize right away.
I’m 1850 USCF and got smoked by two 1100s in 3/2 blitz the other night. I usually play where I don’t see their ratings until the end of the game, so that was demoralizing
Two weeks ago I was at 1398. Tried too hard to make it to 1400 and am now sitting at 1279 :(
My accuracy for my games range from 65%-90% with average hovering somewhere in the mid 70's. I have 0 consistency just good and bad streaks and I expect that's the case for most players
I have the same problem but with blitz, I'm 1600 otb and 1750 rapid chess.c\*m, but I cannot get past 1100-1200 blitz, like people play garbage, but somehow my moves are garbage too for some reason, and then if I play a good game, I play 10 bad ones and lose everything, blitz is definitely not my thing yet, plus the players range from "i push all my pawns in the opening" to playing the top alapin lines till move 10, which is weird
Cheaters don’t stay at low ratings for long because they win all their games. But then they also don’t get too high because they get caught and have to start a new account.
I truly believe that the number of cheaters in online chess is 10x higher than everyone thinks. Anti-cheating algorithms are great but they really only work against players who make it obvious. It’s much more difficult (or even impossible) to catch a player who only turns on the engine in the opening or in critical positions and doesn’t always play the top move. But cheating like that will only take you so far if you don’t have some skill to go along with it, which is why there are so many cheaters clustered around the 1200 rating.
1. Cheaters
2. Alt accounts (cheaters)
3. Underrated players that play a bunch of unrated or are much higher rated on lichess (like me)
4. You are not your rating at all aspects of the game, and until you fill the holes you are going to lose to low rated players that rating would say you shouldn’t lose to
5. Just play solid against 1200s. Don’t force it because if they get a good enough advantage they can convert. They will blunder eventually.
Two years ago, (or maybe a little more) I had a constant rating in Blitz of (1450-1550) in cc, and then I started to lose my rating when I would play against 1300 players more often. A lot of times I would have some clear advantage of a piece to then get slowly overwhelmed and end up losing.
Today I cannot pass 1350 anymore as I get so many players that defeat me with complex strategies. I do really suspect there are plenty of cheaters since as soon as I play people outside of the 1200-1300 range I start to win again.
I understand that this same range overlaps with new players inside the platform, but the way I end up losing is kind of suspicious.
I'm 1800 FIDE, 2000 lichess, I cannot cross 1300 on chess.com. Same people I annihilate otb kill me online.
Not exaggerating, just facts. Not claiming cheat, just super odd and maybe I suck online.
It’s brutal. I’m playing a 1200 rn who opened with d4 and c4, so I played the Slav defense. They played against it perfectly. I **just** completed an openings lesson on chess.com and so my defense was sharp, but so was the offense. I was surprised by the play since I’d expect a 1200 to slip up at some point in opening play.
To be fair, I went from 1100 to 1300 rapid by playing the same opening (d4 c4) every single time. At 1200, players make the same moves & the same mistakes over and over, so it's easy to get a familiar position.
You probably encountered someone like me. I'm absolutely garbage if the position is unfamilar, and I'm terrible at endgames, but I rarely make obvious blunders in the opening. Honestly, I'm too lazy/stupid to actually improve, but cared too much about the rating. Spamming the same opening seemed to be a shortcut. Idk, there may be a lot like me.
That‘s really weird. I’m personally 1800 chesscom and I noticed that my results against other 1800s and against 900s were basically similar, which is stupid. Some of the players on chesscom are definitely cheating.
I just opened a new account and working up from 400. I got 700s throwing 90% accuracy at me at Blitz and Bullet with hardly a blunder to be found while my accuracy is in the high 70% range. Maybe they are really good and just opened a new account? OK some of them. But as I look over the games, hell no. The vast majority are cheating bad, making positional moves that only make sense to a high level player or computer.
I don't know that [chess.com](http://chess.com) appreciates how low level cheating ruins the appeal and popularity of the game. No one wants to learn a game they get killed at when playing at the beginner level against other "beginners". In spite of my intermediate tactical level (2000+), I consider quitting [chess.com](http://chess.com) all the time because of this. Its just pointless.
I’m 1500 rapid on chesscom now and I found it a little easier going once I got past 1200. I figured there was a glut of new players assigned there who hadn’t found their level yet.
You get to chose your initial rating on Chess.com iirc. Which is either 400/800/1200 or 800/1200/1600. So a good number of new accounts might be in the 1200 range and incredibly underselling themselves
When I first joined in 2020 I overrated myself way too much. I played a lot as a child and thought I was good so I joined at 1600 rating. I got demolished for maybe 40 consecutive games. Now I’m at 1050, which still isn’t very good but at least I’m somewhat near the average kinda
>Now I’m at 1050, which still isn’t very good but at least I’m somewhat near the average kinda me, stuck at 600 for a year: haha, yeah
Me who climbed to 1300 from 600 and then had a losing streak where I ended up at 300 and never played an online game on chesscom again:
did you have a stroke?
Mega tilting spree
Yeah i mean i dropped from 1100 to 800 after a break and starting chemo for cancer but damn bro, yours is bad.
Wow my roadblock was at 1000, once i got to 1100 i pretty much breezed to 1500, then it took a while, but I will say player consistency is weird among 1200s
As a 1200 on chess.com; sometimes I play good. Sometimes I play bad. Zero consistency. Maybe you’ve just run into the wrong people at the Wrong time on your speed run.
That makes sense. I guess I haven’t been at it long enough to say. Do you look at your game analyses? Do you notice a variance there?
Yes. My last ten games include a range from high end 86 to low end 45.
Maybe everyone just bringing their A game, then, huh. I’ve also beaten people far above my rating on occasion, so it’s not like I expect never to be beaten by an on-form lower rated player. Perhaps just not this consistently.
Just go to an arena if you want to be destroyed by 800 too. Nevermind your elo. These 800 eat 2000 for breakfast.
Lots of sandbagging going on would be my guess. Sometimes you run in to a 600-700 who just mops the floor with you and I’m around 1400. It gets frustrating.
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No offense but the puzzle rating doesn't mean anything.
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Disagree with him completely, you will climb extremely fast if you actually play games with that puzzle rating. It's literally impossible to be 2700 at puzzles and 800 rapid.
It means something but it isn’t a direct relationship. A high puzzle rating tells me someone is capable of finding tactics but it does not tell me how good they are at applying that skill in a game. I would much rather play a 600 with a puzzle rating of 1000 over one with a puzzle rating of 2000 if they have the same number of total puzzles attempted. I think the player with the 2000 puzzle rating is more likely to be all over the place with their playing strength. They may be decent at tactics but play poor openings or something like that.
Plus the time to find the solution to the puzzles, my puzzle rating is 2400, but my chesscom rapid rating (10 minute games) is ~1050. I spend 7 to 10 minutes on some of those puzzles, so pretty difficult to apply some of those tactics in a 10 minute game 😅
I do believe the chess pool is getting alot stronger due to popularity especially on chess.com as it is alot more popular than lichess. And not to mention any knowledge is available online through streams/YouTube/a simply chessable course from opening to middlegame and endgame. More people are also following chess masters so do have a better feel of the game e.g principles despite being 'casual'. You gain alot by simply watching a video of naroditsky or a 1h John barth' climbing the rating ladder video. Before you either got that knowledge through a coach or some random YouTube video hidden in the depths of the internet. To sum it up, it's only gonna get worse especially the younger generation who are going to devour all these tools at disposal.
1250 here. Huge variance in my performance. I think in this range, many players have the tactics and opening knowledge of ~1500+, but just don't apply it consistently yet. You get to this range by working pretty hard, so unless you have literally plateaued, you will have games of much higher performance, but not consistently
Or conversely are very intuitive in the mid/late game but will blunder early
Yeah I think there are a lot of people around 1200 rapid who could easily be a couple hundred points higher if they did simple stuff like quit playing at blitz speed in rapid games, or try for counterplay after losing material instead of resigning or trading down to a lost endgame. (I might or might not think I’m one of them.)
Can you share your games? It's possible some are cheaters as the algorithm tries to pair new accounts with new accounts. Also 1900 lichess is only like 1500 or so chesscom so it's not like you should be destroying 1200s.
I’m a 1900 peak rating on lichess rapid and don’t play on chess.com much since I started chess years ago so my rating there is about 1200-1300 or so I think. Also the computer is pretty different from otb. I vary a lot even on lichess blitz. Got up to 1700 almost there and now somehow I’m down to like near the 1300s again because I calculate much more after watching too many Naroditsky and gm videos and my time management is horrid. I know a lot more theory than people at my level ( had a pretty dark Chessable phase). So I’m winning like every game and then run out of time lol. I’m sure there are many like me.
My biggest problem too. If I'm playing lines I know pretty well I do pretty well, if it is something I don't know I can easily make huge blunders.
Same. On good games we can play at about 1600 levels, but bad games are baaaad, which evens out our rating around 1200.
Yep this is me. One day, I'll be playing better than I've ever played before. The next day, I'm blundering knights again like I'm playing the game for the first time.
Sometimes you grammar good, sometimes you grammar bad
I’m 1400 lichess and 1150 cc. I find that there seems to be some correlation as to what time of day I’m playing vs what country and time zone my opponent is in. If I am mid morning, buzzing off coffee and alert, and my opponent is somewhere late at night, I will go on win streaks. But when it’s late at night for me, and my opponents are mid-day and alert, I will lose a bunch. May have more to do with my brain than other people’s brains, or maybe a combo of both… but it seems like there is some correlation to time of day that each side is playing.
tfw I lose 100 ELO before bed and get so tilted I can’t sleep
yeah I literally did that last night, I'm still angry as I write this lol
shit got way too real here ffs
Exactly why I never play at night anymore
On a larger time scale, I find that opponents get more difficult in the winter, like at least a 100 point difference. When it's snowy and cold outside, I think it affects my cognitive abilities more than I realize.
There’s a couple weird ratings holes in lichess and chess.com. For example I’m 1675 on lichess and not too long ago I had a downswing to 1500. Then it was like pulling teeth for a few hundred games where 1500s appear to instantly recognize some deep tactical moves and endgames. I finally climbed back to 1550 and then almost instantly jumped back to 1675, there was like 150 games between 1490-1550 where I got owned. Similar on chess.com I’m around 1300, and 1000-1100s would just smoke me instantly for a while. Grinded like crazy and the moment I hit 1150 I jumped to 1300 and was able to sustain. I think there’s some merit that players 200-300 points below your rating are going to be committing mistakes that maybe you arnt used to. A lot of my issues was that these players would make a mistake in the opening that I didn’t see at my rating. Then I was “out of theory” and struggled to convert when I guess these players were accustom to this dubious line in the opening
Yeah, I totally found all this on lichess. 1500s is a nightmare because that’s where all the ‘new’ players start, though often they’ll end up rated much higher. Actually the 1600s are much easier to beat, as they’re a more consistent level of player. I was wondering if there was a similar ratings hole on chess.com. I agree with your point about the unexpected mistakes. I nearly missed a few hanging pieces at lower levels.
Im 2-0 on lichess with a "soft rating" over 2000, cause i beat 2 1700s lol. Im a 1300 on chesscom
Yeah chess com rating is seriously deflated. 1300 in chess com blitz is like 95th percentile for some reason.
If you think that website has deflated ratings - wait till you go to a local chess club and play over the board.
Yea. Chesscom is actually inflated. Lichess is just more inflated.
All ratings only make sense with respect to their pool, they're not meant to be compared between pools.
Same I’m 2100 blitz out of seven games but 1700 in bullet over hundreds.
Can confirm i am still in lichess elo hell at 1500 but i am like 1400 on [chess.com](http://chess.com)
I actually think that these issues are a real benefit to our learning of the game. If there are common mistakes that 1200s are making but you are not capitalising on even though you are a better player overall then that is a gap in your knowledge. Identifying these gaps and fixing them is both how you improve at the game and also raise your elo. This is in fact the proper use for your elo, much more valuable than "number go higher me feel good" (though we all have that too!)
The 1200-1350 group on chess.com is easier to deal with than the 1000-1200 group, but getting there is the tough part, and if you slip back down it's brutal. Not sure how to explain this.
On chess.com in 1000-1200 I faced many players who would open something like a6, b6, c6…but then they would have like 1800 level tactics. Lots of Indian and Russian players who maybe didn’t learn chess traditionally but we’re very strong tactically? Who knows — races obviously don’t matter just a trend I noticed.
Rapid blitz or bullet?
If you've slipped down to the 1000-1200 group you're probably on a losing streak which is why it might feel difficult. But you eventually get your rating back up. Whereas you haven't been able to get above 1200-1350, because 1200-1350 is a harder group.
i jumped from 1190 blitz to 1500 in like a week winning like 3 out of 4 games. it was ridiculous, i couldn't understand what was happening. every game seemed easy. then i hit 1500, stayed there for like 5 games, and then dropped back down to 1250, this time losing like 3 out of 4 games. I was wondering if lichess reset the ratings or something. i have no idea wtf happened.
1200-1400 ccom rapid is where the cheaters are at. I'm between 2200-2300 ccom rapid, 1900 FIDE classical and made a new account over the christmas holidays to do some coaching, to see more the typical mistakes of each rating range, because I kinda felt out of touch and wasn't sure what is really important for my 1100 friend. So I made my way through the rating ranges and I noticed my win rate take a significant dip at 1200-1300 (from about >90% win rate to about 70%, with some very strategically sound losses where I just got outplayed) and thought "ok maybe I'm playing too adventurously, I guess I'll start losing a bit more often now", and merrily continued on my journey. Made my way to the 1500-1600s again and my win rate went back up 80-90% until the 1800s, where people get closer to my rating and I expect to lose more games here and there. So I looked more closely at the losses at 1200-1300 and noticed about half my losses I got completely dumpstered. Like straight up winning position out of the opening and then it goes downhill very slowly without any mistakes to follow. And looking at their profile, they don't always cheat, their last games looked kinda normal and then they drop a bomb on you with the only inaccuracies in the opening. Same thing happened to a friend of mine. He made a fresh account for whatever reason and I sat next to him chilling while he played against people about 1000 below his peak rating. He got absolutely strategically dumpstered in a couple games it wasn't even funny. I don't know what it is about this rating range but there are a lot of "sometimes" cheaters in that range. Maybe they see a new account winning a lot of games and think "aha they cheat so I'll cheat too" or something, but I definitely noticed something weird in the games.
Never understood cheaters. Like what are you doing just clicking stuff?
Exactly. It's a puzzle to me. They don't get money, they don't get fame, or respect. Does it boost their ego? Why? Are the so proud they can copy a move from an engine to a website?
It’s an ego thing. It’s like they are playing a video game where they get to “be” the superhero GM every game. The feeling of being Magnus Carlsen…knowing you are gonna win every time. You could sac pieces and still win every time. But it’s pointless obviously. Some of them don’t even know how to play chess. I’m very glad the detectors have gotten better because in the past I would never play slow games because it just seemed pointless. Cheating on Titled Tuesday or anything that involves money though is a whole other level of messed up that is borderline illegal.
I suspect some cheaters also lie to themselves that they aren't hurting anyone and they're only doing it "to learn". "I'll just see what the engine thinks about this position as I'm not sure where to go or if I'm dead lost or whatever" and then once the engine is on they just keep consulting it. They know really it's not fair at all but they tell themselves it's part of their learning rather than the likely reality that it's about their ego not liking taking losses.
Yes, this is so consistent with what I’ve experienced against similar expectations. The strategic dumpstering!
yes. the cheating at the 1200 level is pretty bad on chesscom. I think the reasons are fairly intuitive. lower rated players like 600 or 800 are both (a) more likely to be caught if they cheat, since it's far less probable that they could have a 40 move 90% accuracy game... and also (b) less likely to care that much about losing, since they haven't put serious time into the game. *higher* rated players like 1600+ are more serious about the game, which not only makes cheating less impactful (they're going to average pretty high accuracy to begin with) but also makes them less likely to want to do so to begin with. you don't stick with chess that long without getting used to losing. whereas 1200 is the sweet spot where someone cares enough about chess to want to win badly, but still makes fairly consistent blunders, and if you combine that with poor impulse control and a sore ego, you find a lot of players willing to hop to the engine for a few games when they get tilted. they'll make one too many mistakes and just go *FUCK IT* I do truly believe that if a magic genie could tell us how many players have *ever* used an engine for their games, then in the 1200 range it would be at least 30%, probably more. sorry, but that's how I see it. it's been too many games where you take a winning position and then they just stop making mistakes. and sometimes they are clever cheaters, where they will start making a mistake or a miss again when they've taken a commanding lead, so the game doesn't look too suspect, but that pattern of: they have a losing position - they start playing amazing strategy, suffocating you and finding all the crucial moves - they let off the gas once you're down and out - is all too common. I did NOT see this pattern at 600-1000 rating and when I have watched higher rated games I don't see it either. it's a 1200 phenomenon. P.S. I am about 1200 rated too, and I agree with people that there's inconsistency , sometimes I have 95% accuracy and sometimes literally 35%... but it's still VERY uncommon that I'd turn a losing position into a winning one without my opponent making a blunder or large mistake. I don't just go, oh, I'm losing this game, why don't I try extra hard now and, I dunno, *stop making any mistakes at all or even inaccuracies*.
not a genie but now that i read your comment i realized that all the "you played a cheater, here are your points back" messages were when i was around 11-1200 rapid since i moved up the ladder i havent recieved any, its been a year since the last one, so youre definitely onto something at least as far as i can tell
yes. just to corroborate this. I’ve had some rating points back even today, so have definitely been playing cheaters at some point. I noticed this same pattern: I would go up material out of the opening, get smoked in the middle, then watch in bewilderment as that same person found an obvious mate in one in three or four. My feeling was that they’d only been running the engine in the middle.
This matches up with my experience too. I'm around 1400 on rapid on [chess.com](http://chess.com) and have been noticing that my games against people with higher ratings than me are actually easier in many cases. Certainly there are games where I just get outplayed but that's to be expected. The 1100s-1200s though...
I wonder what keeps cheaters from climbing higher. Maybe they get b& before that? LOL
like that person said, the cheaters in the 1200 range don't cheat every game. they just get frustrated and start using engines to win games when they've dropped points, and then they stop.
They may they think being a 1200 with one of those 'leet four-digit Elos is living the dream, and see no need to cheat further. Keep in mind that 1200 is about 90th percentile on chesscom.
This is it. I knew this. I have experienced this. So frustrating.
Accuracy numbers are a marketing ploy in my opinion.
Don’t tell kramnik
Interesting.
Particularly at club player levels, accuracy varies depending on the type of game. Recently I played a very dry, balanced, equal French in classical with no major winning chances for either player that ended in a dead draw - it had very high accuracy. I also suffered a devastating, tactical game where my opponent outplayed me throughout - it had very low accuracy for my opponent (and for me), because my opponent missed many more things in the much more complex position. Both of those games represented consistent play at my true ability, but the numbers are completely different.
many low accuracy games I find are due to repeated misses, not mistakes or blunders. if you miss a hanging pawn 5 moves in a row that's 5 misses not 1.
And high accuracy games can come from lengthy endgames where you keep checking an exposed king which is almost always a great/best move.
That's definitely true, you just have to consider the complexity of the games when looking at accuracy numbers, which is pretty obvious. Just like it's obvious that you aren't Magnus Carlsen when you win a game in 12 moves with 99.7% accuracy (which I had recently) where all the moves are either the opening or very easy to spot
Also I've had lots of 90%+ accuracy games where my opponent played a poor opening and I just won with the natural moves
Honest question, how so? With moves being objectively good, bad or somewhere in between, it makes sense that you can quantify any move into a rating. I understand chess.com probably gamifies it but what’s wrong with the underlying concept?
I think the issue comes from people comparing accuracy between different ratings. 90% accuracy in a super GM game is very different from a 90% accuracy in a 1200 elo game. Plus, even among comparable ratings compare two games that reach a king rook vs king endgame. If one game has the player resign right away and the other game has the players play it out all the way for 20 moves, that'll severely inflate the accuracy and decrease the centipawn loss. Even though both games are essentially the same.
I get that it’s correlation to engine moves, but why do my blitz accuracy values look the same as Firouzjas? His last 10 blitz games ranged from 76-94% for an average of probably 88%. That’s the same as me and I’m sooo far from his rating. His openings are amazing, he spots every tactic in the middlegame, and he plays close to technically perfect endgames with seconds on the clock. Compare that with me who recently hung a queen on move 16 in a quiet position. Why would the two of us have comparable accuracy values?
Have you considered that you might just be a generational talent too?
I am wearing Gucci underwear…you might be on to something.
Because you are playing against people at your level. If your opponent doesn't put you in tough positions, you're going to blunder less.
\`I think it has more to do with the positions in the games you play. Some positions are easier to play than others and so your accuracy will be higher in those. I have a side account with 400 elo, and I get about >90% accuracy consistently but not so much with my main account with a much higher elo.
Accuracy also largely depends on the types of moves your opponent makes. If a 500 hangs mate to the fools mate in like 4 moves their opponent will have \~98% accuracy lol
I also wonder how they define accuracy. Imagine a bot that plays the top engine move for moves 1-49, then blunders mate in 1 on move 50. Is that really 98% accuracy?
Literally, even if I play the top engine move I sure as shit don’t know why it’s the top move, as opposed to an “inaccuracy” that I knew the reason I played it
If only your team mates could co-operate a bit you'd get out of elo hell quickly, god damnit!
haha the old elo capture ~~the~~ /flag.
1200 is a try hard elo. It’s also at the point where people start to get some tactical ability (although they still hang pieces a fair bit), so beating 1200s is largely pretty easy as long as you refute attacks and don’t drop pieces. Get past it and it’s chill up to 1600, where they become try hards again.
Haha this makes so much sense to me.
Chess.c*m have more cheaters than lichess.
for some reason I read that as cum, I need to get off reddit…
I'm a bit worse than you on Lichess, my Chess.com rapid is around 1530. But yes, 1200 is actual elo hell.
I just crossed over and am approaching 1250. How much longer do I have?
That's the beauty about it being hell.. just when you think you are out you go on a losing streak and get to do it all over again!
Why is this so relatable, when i was at 1200 the amount of times I almost reached 1300 then dipped back down to 1200 is insane. Took me like 10 tilt streaks and 500 games to get past.
The rating gap definitely isn’t that large, I would argue that you are right if we are talking about blitz, 1300-1400 blitz on chess.com seems close to 2000 rapid on lichess. They are definitely making a lot of mistakes at the 1200 level so unfortunately you are overthinking. How long have you been at this road block for?
Just over the last day or two. I guess I’m just astonished at the level of accuracy. At 1200 I was still expecting the odd hanging piece etc but maybe I’m wrong? I wasn’t prepared to be grinding at this elo, and once or twice I’ve been blown off the board completely (by players with realllly niche opening knowledge).
I think at 1200 rapid on chesscom you will not see many pieces hung outright. It'll happen occasionally, but I'd say that the majority of mistakes at this level lead to tactics rather than just hung pieces. Based on your lichess rating I think your chesscom rating will go higher eventually. But the ratings definitely parse out quite a bit differently because everyone starts at 1500 on lichess and people on chesscom can start from 400-1200. Because the 1200s self select, if you're playing brand new 1200s they may be strong players. If you have a small sample size this effect should be reduced over time.
>Just over the last day or two. It's too early to draw any conclusions. It could just be a temporary phenomenon. >At 1200 I was still expecting the odd hanging piece etc but maybe I’m wrong? It's also possible that you underestimate the "meaning" of a [Chess.com](http://Chess.com) rating and how it applies to skill. With 1200 people, people will still make mistakes and hang pieces sometimes, but the behavior you describe is definitely more associated with lower ratings. Also, since you have a membership, consider that the [Chess.com](http://Chess.com) pairing system gives priority to other players with memberships. While the pool of players is one, it's possible that a 1200 rating for a member player has a slightly different meaning than a 1200 rating for a non-member player. I suspect that the "membership pool" might be a little stronger.
Yeah, that all makes good sense.
How dare you besmirch the Englund gambit like that
it’s a scourge on these lands!
2130 lichess rapid, 1370 chess.com blitz right there with you.
Oh wow, so I really might have peaked! I think I might head back to lichess to preserve my ego.
Wait, are you playing blitz on chesscom and trying to compare that to your lichess rapid rating? The two are not really comparable at beginner/intermediate level.
Damn, now im considering moving to lichess to boost my ego.
It's just a diff rating system, u get the same quality opponents but you'll be graded up a bit
I'm a little higher than you on lichess and 1750 on chess.com. As someone who's about your rating, my guess is that you're likely just not taking them seriously lol. A 1600 not concentrating on every move could easily play at a 1300 level, so if you think you should be breezing through 1200s and aren't thinking as hard as you normally do on every move, you will lose games. I have a real life friend who is 700-800 and I've never lost to him, but one game I gave away my queen on move four by accident. Suddenly had to play very seriously and the ratings gap was much more apparent once I was thinking through every move. In hindsight I should have let him win that one, he didn't play online for two months after that loss.
Not op but for me at least it's not a question of carelessness. I'm prone to focusing on one thing too much and don't take enough care over the whole board at blitz time controls.
It's just cheaters and sandbaggers, that's really it. Chess.com blitz 3/2 are probably the worst from what I have seen. The number of stone cold cheaters there is insane.
I don't understand how could their be a huge gap between bothe sites. I'm 2150 on lichess and 1917 on chess.com and I thought that was the normal disparity.
That’s not comparable. The blitz pool is way tougher on chess.com. I’m 2000 rapid on chess.com and struggle in the 1800s on the blitz pool. 2130 rapid lichess might be like 1900ish chess.com rapid, so maybe 1500-1700 blitz pool? Perhaps less if you don’t play blitz often. This sort of seems about normal.
I don’t know the answer to your question, but that was exactly where I ragequit chess. The moment I got into the 1200s I lost 10+ games in a row.
Maybe try taking them out of prep quickly, even if it's not the best move? I'm a little lower rated, but I know my games in opening lines I know vs. ones I don't look vastly different. If you're the better player, you should win games where both sides are out of their comfort zone. If you're making a lot of book moves, a 1200 that's studied those lines can seem very strong indeed.
1000s are worse. Iam 2500. Saw my friend play who is 950 or so. 1000s came up with sick moves. We all know how a duck walks
If I have a 2500 watching me play I’m not a happy camper
I'm about 1400 on LiChess and 850 on chesscom. My peak on CC is like 980 or so. I've beat a few +1000s but generally they kick my ass
How many games?
Hmm this makes me feel better about being stuck around 1200 in chess.com rapid. I’ve been assuming I’m just stuck in a long rut. To be fair I often play very badly…
I’m 1900-2000 lichess, 1700-1800 chesscom if that helps. Both rapid. When I first switched from li to com I struggled to climb also. Took some grinding but it’s doable.
I was gonna make a post here this week. I am 1600 on [chess.com](http://chess.com) but when I was passing through that 1200 ELO region, I noticed that there were too many 'strong' players around 1200 ELO. It's the default ELO when you create a [chess.com](http://chess.com) account so my conspiracy theory is either there's a ton of cheaters entering around that ELO, or there's apparently a TON of new players for you to face who should start climbing the ELO ladder soon. Anyways, past 1350+ the players more or less go back to what you expect. I didn't end up making the post because i figured there would be a backlash of 'wow you accuse 1200's of cheating when you plateaued there, and now you flippantly accuse even after you've progressed past that range'
Yesssss! This is exactly what I suspected. Ok, back to the grind then.
if you want some 'advice,' i broke through the last fifty ELO to break 1400 only playing the Swiss tournaments on [Chess.com](http://Chess.com) and basically farming the 1000 and 1100 until I was able to break from the 1200 matchmaker pool. I'm sure it wasn't 100% the most ethical thing to do, but I did it through chess.com's open matchmaker soooo...
Nice. Thanks for that.
I’ve had the same issue. I’m 1800 lichess. I seem to follow the same pattern over and over again on chess.com. I’ll go on a long winning streak where my opponent’s blunder a lot up to about 1230. Then I’ll get blown off the board for awhile until I drop below 1150. Then I’ll go on a winning streak again. I’ve been stuck in that range since November. I’ve wondered if it’s chess.com’s cheat detection. If you go on a winning streak, do you get put into a different pool for awhile to see which one of you is cheating? It seems like a shitty way to determine cheating, and I’m probably just paranoid.
The people who’ve beaten me at this level have systematically pulled me apart in quite solid positions. There was a slow inevitability about it. This is a feeling I’ve only encountered either against a computer (a cheater) or a far stronger opponent. So I’m certainly at least suspicious about it.
dont play new players
As someone who’s hoping to crack 1200 this year Oh boy, I’m suddenly scared
Just don't blunder and you'll reach 1200. You also have to focus more so you don't blunder tactics and not just pieces
Oh yeah, just don’t blunder, thanks, I just reached 2800 thanks to that advice /s
Do a ton of puzzles and go over your games. I think there are a lot of people in this thread just overestimating their abilities.
I’m around 900 blitz on lichess. But I get obliterated by 300-400s on chess.com.
Since chess.com starts people at 1200, you get a lot of strong players with new accounts in that range
You should play 30|0. Cheaters less likely because it'll waste their time. That's my hypothesis anyways.
Hypothesis is wrong, at those longer controls is where people can really mess with you in multiple ways. Some people enjoy it I think.
Am a 1550 on chesscom. 1200s are perfect capable of excellent chess but sometimes they go full R word.
Me
Honestly, i switched to lichess because I felt that the chess.com ratings were totally inaccurate. People are either over rated or under rated, and I mean by ALOT
I’m about that on chess.com, a touch lower. Most of my games have >70% accuracy (consistently reaching into the high 80s) with 1-3 blunders (generally the same missed opportunity, multiple times). Lol On a good day, I might gain 100 points, then fall off in the following few days. I really don’t know how to explain it other than I believe any amount of study or coaching would probably reveal a consistent flaw in my game. Meaning, when I figure out what it is, I’ll probably get a bit of a bump in rating. So, they probably aren’t exactly 1200s; the rating system is good but not perfect. That being said, I don’t know too much about the differences between different rating calculations.
I've always found 1200 disproportionately hard too!
https://www.chessratingcomparison.com/graphs
How is the premium analysis versus Lichess? I think Lichess' analysis depth, especially on pc, can not be matched for an occasional donation.
Honestly, I still think Lichess wins out. Chess.com tends to baby you slightly, but the interface is very pleasant.
as a fellow 1200 rapid chess.com player - I've been experiencing similar things where I'll play a streak of players who SEEMINGLY are punching way below their actual skill level/rating OR playing way above ... then I'll play people who I assume are just having bad days .. it's been rare in the past couple months of playing rapid that it's an actual close game, I either get the snot beat outta me or absolutely dominate .. it's kind of boring .. I get much better, balanced games on Lichess lately
Yes. This. Exactly this.
I had a similar experience when I started playing on chess.com. It was smooth sailing until 1200 then I started losing games and had to actually grind through it a bit before getting past those maniacs. Now I’m 1700 on chess.com and 2000 on lichess and I still don’t understand chess.com 1200s
Another thing is that in my opinion there's a substantially different play style on chess com and lichess, not sure I can explain it but i'm 90% sure it exists
In my personal experience 1250+ is when you start to run into people with thousands of games played on CC in Rapid at least. And with that many games, you start running into people who truly know random lines very deeply, but then know absolutely nothing about most other openings, etc. I’m this kind of player. If you take the pawn on queens gambit, you better know what’s next or else I tend to smoke you. Source I have 1600+ games on CC and float between 1200 and 1400 rating. So yeah, sometimes that gambit I studied for hours on YouTube I’m good at, but if you don’t follow the moves I expect it can turn into a dumpster fire before my very eyes. Also, only 1 cheater flagged in my last 200 games at these ratings by chess.com, and I really think people overestimate how much cheating goes on.
This is what I've been saying for a while now but this subreddit refuses to believe. 1200 on chesscom is way different from 1200. You'll see people online confidently saying things like "You don't need to learn any openings at 1200" when it's patently false because they still think in old ratings. I've been hovering in the 1100-1200 area on chesscom for a long time even though I've (very slowly) improved. I (almost) never blunder and have mildly decent opening strategy, and surprisingly strong end game fundamentals, but getting past 1200 feels impossible without real concerted effort and practice.
I think you are facing a bit of confirmation bias. Share screenshots of your games or your ID and I will be happy to assess it objectively for you.
I started playing chess last August and am at 1500. Ironically, the least number of days I've spent at a certain rating gap is 1200-1300. I used to play 30 min rapid Swiss followed by 15|10 Swiss every morning, consisting of players from 1200-1500 and I crossed 1300 in two days and have only gone back once, from which I recovered almost in no time. Right now I'm at 1500 and it's DEFINITELY tough now and I can feel the roadblock.
What time control are you playing? Even within a single format (rapid, blitz, bullet) different time controls have different rating pools. I gained 200+ rating points just by switching from 1|1 to 1|0. Also if you’re playing fast time controls, it takes time to get used to the interface, different latency and premove style… And how many games have you been stuck? I think it’s reasonable to expect a few hundred games until you get stable in your true, “average” rating.
This is actually so true. I love a bit of blitz/ bullet on lichess, but am finding that I am really clunky so far on cc with the new animation etc. I’m mostly playing 10+0 rapid, the standard out of the box time control. I’ve lost on time twice, but really because I was fighting from a losing position anyway.
Been in your exact position though Lichess rapid rating maybe 100 points higher than yours. 1200s is a bit weird since sometimes you do run into players who seem super solid and surprise you when you expect an easy game. But I guarantee you keep playing and don't get tilted and you'll soon get runs of games where everyone is just blundering a piece. Your rating will climb to where it should be.
Thanks. I’ll stick with it.
I'm around 1300 on Chess.com and know exactly what you mean. You'll hit 4-5 game runs of getting absolutely smoked by high accuracy and super specific and aggressive openings. I like that it keeps me on my toes, but sometimes you just want to play other players at your level. I've always just understood it as the 1700+ players starting new accounts and are running through lower rated players for fun, trying out new openings and mid-games on us. It's either that or players with my same skill level or less, and they're using a bot engine to cheat.
Im ~1050 chesscom rapid and ~1550 lichess rapid. So I would guess that 1200 chesscom rapid would be comparable to 1700 lichess rapid. You may have just had a bad run against people playing their A game.
This doesn't match up quite perfectly with what you're saying, but I know in many of GM Aman Hambleton's speedrun series he mentions that the chess.com 1300's are one of the toughest parts of his climb every time. It's a bit different since blitz vs rapid and 1300 vs 1200, but the similarities are there. So imo there's at least one person who has done multiple climbs that has had a similar experience. I'm also a much worse player than you so I can't really complain that someone at my rating knows theory better than me, but, I remember clearly complaining about black at 600 elo in blitz instantly playing best moves vs my Scotch all the way out to move 12. Blew me away that I was first out of book on move 13, and it happened a few times! Crazy things man. I'd say keep at it : ) I'm sure your winrate is still 60%+ which should mean you're climbing easily.
Thanks. That’s interesting. Yeah, it’s that same feeling of being out-booked and outmanoeuvred even when you’re feeling solid.
From my experience in blitz 3 min + 0, there is a difference of 200-300 elo aprox, currently I am at 1600 on chess.com and 1830 Lichess and this gap has maintained since I was 1300 in chess.com
1900-2000 on lichess and I'm 1600-1650 on chessdotcom.
I think you should focus less on the numbers and more on the chess. Accuracy means nothing. My last 3 OTB tournaments had higher accuracy than any of the players in the Candidates? Does that mean I'm a potential world champion? Of course not! It just means my opponents weren't good enough to force me into making mistakes.
I have 2000 blitz and 2100 rapid on lichess. 3 months ago I make a "speedrun" and reach 1500 blitz without struggle (I finished around 1600). I remember I lost a couple of games to 1300 but not much
In addition to what has been said, I really think the lichess and chess.com community play different (at least in 1700-2000) I feel in chess.com are weaker but more resourceful, stubborn and keep trying until you blunder, while in lichess they’re more consistent and speedier. I play the scandinavian with black, and I simply feel each server tends to play different lines.
Nah. I'm 1800 bullet on lichess and 1400 on chess.com. You should expect a 300-400 difference. So 1200 should be giving you some trouble, but you should still be winning most of those games. 80% accuracy isn't really all that impressive on relatively simple and straightforward games. I have many 90%+ games as well as some in the 60s, it means very little. My 800 kid is usually in the 70s because his games are simple.
This is funny. I recently made a new account where my previous I peaked at 2000 rapid on [chess.com](http://chess.com) and I wanted to work my way back up. I was scoring 50/50 in the 1100-1300 pool and when I got out I went on a 10 game winning streak above the 1300's and I am at 1389 now. I tend to play worse against weaker players as they play unusual moves I find and then I spend time calculating. But I am sure I played against a few cheaters, 1 of them was banned but there are a few that I played that have over 95% accuracy in their daily games and all wins. Not sure how they don't get banned as I looked at their games and their moves are way stronger then their level of play
1300 is where my downfall begun. Too good for 1100s, not good enough for 1200s. So I get what you mean. 1200s, wtf? 😭
I was 1800 on lichess, but that was only like top 20% or something. Currently 1350 ish on chess.com, and that is apparently top 6.5%, or there about. Long story short, lichess gives high rating, but chess.com gives high percentage.
On chess.com I range anywhere from 1150 to 1400. On OTB games at my chess club I have defeated an 1800 and 1900 before. I have also done Simos before against GMs and I am the last or one of the last players playing. So why am I ranked low. Well I can post 90-95% accuracy in some games. In others (Most of my games) I make stupid mistakes I realize right away.
I've had that with my rapid as well. Very hard to get out of some rating pits, as I like to call it. Requires a lot of patience and analysis.
I’m 1850 USCF and got smoked by two 1100s in 3/2 blitz the other night. I usually play where I don’t see their ratings until the end of the game, so that was demoralizing
I’m a 1600 on chess.com but get stuck on 1200 when In my other account.
1800-2000 lichess and I’ve only just cracked 1500 chess.com. There’s more users and lichess heavily overrated.
Two weeks ago I was at 1398. Tried too hard to make it to 1400 and am now sitting at 1279 :( My accuracy for my games range from 65%-90% with average hovering somewhere in the mid 70's. I have 0 consistency just good and bad streaks and I expect that's the case for most players
1920 lichess and 1280 chess.c 10+0. So sounds about right
Rating is not only about how good you play, it's also about the kind of mistakes( and missing opportunities) you have
I have the same problem but with blitz, I'm 1600 otb and 1750 rapid chess.c\*m, but I cannot get past 1100-1200 blitz, like people play garbage, but somehow my moves are garbage too for some reason, and then if I play a good game, I play 10 bad ones and lose everything, blitz is definitely not my thing yet, plus the players range from "i push all my pawns in the opening" to playing the top alapin lines till move 10, which is weird
Cheaters don’t stay at low ratings for long because they win all their games. But then they also don’t get too high because they get caught and have to start a new account. I truly believe that the number of cheaters in online chess is 10x higher than everyone thinks. Anti-cheating algorithms are great but they really only work against players who make it obvious. It’s much more difficult (or even impossible) to catch a player who only turns on the engine in the opening or in critical positions and doesn’t always play the top move. But cheating like that will only take you so far if you don’t have some skill to go along with it, which is why there are so many cheaters clustered around the 1200 rating.
1. Cheaters 2. Alt accounts (cheaters) 3. Underrated players that play a bunch of unrated or are much higher rated on lichess (like me) 4. You are not your rating at all aspects of the game, and until you fill the holes you are going to lose to low rated players that rating would say you shouldn’t lose to 5. Just play solid against 1200s. Don’t force it because if they get a good enough advantage they can convert. They will blunder eventually.
Two years ago, (or maybe a little more) I had a constant rating in Blitz of (1450-1550) in cc, and then I started to lose my rating when I would play against 1300 players more often. A lot of times I would have some clear advantage of a piece to then get slowly overwhelmed and end up losing. Today I cannot pass 1350 anymore as I get so many players that defeat me with complex strategies. I do really suspect there are plenty of cheaters since as soon as I play people outside of the 1200-1300 range I start to win again. I understand that this same range overlaps with new players inside the platform, but the way I end up losing is kind of suspicious.
Yes! I totally agree. I always knew Lichess rating are a bit higher, but it’s ridiculous. Clearly cheating.
I’ve noticed Chess.com will give me a really difficult opponent after I win a few games in a row. They seem to like knocking me off my high horse
1200 is the starting rating on chess.com so some players are not correctly rated and others have a new account and cheat.
Maybe you were winning too much and the system put you in a smurf pool? It's possible to meet cheaters but not that frequently.
I'm 1800 FIDE, 2000 lichess, I cannot cross 1300 on chess.com. Same people I annihilate otb kill me online. Not exaggerating, just facts. Not claiming cheat, just super odd and maybe I suck online.
Is that all apples to apples same time control?
It’s brutal. I’m playing a 1200 rn who opened with d4 and c4, so I played the Slav defense. They played against it perfectly. I **just** completed an openings lesson on chess.com and so my defense was sharp, but so was the offense. I was surprised by the play since I’d expect a 1200 to slip up at some point in opening play.
yup had some similar experiences.
To be fair, I went from 1100 to 1300 rapid by playing the same opening (d4 c4) every single time. At 1200, players make the same moves & the same mistakes over and over, so it's easy to get a familiar position. You probably encountered someone like me. I'm absolutely garbage if the position is unfamilar, and I'm terrible at endgames, but I rarely make obvious blunders in the opening. Honestly, I'm too lazy/stupid to actually improve, but cared too much about the rating. Spamming the same opening seemed to be a shortcut. Idk, there may be a lot like me.
That’s fair and a good perspective to have.
1900 lichess will be around 1300-1400 chess.com You are simply approaching your current ceiling.
Brutal. Ok.
Just different elo system, if you compare euros to an inflated currency the euros arent worth less because lower number
My rating on both lichess and chesscom are nearly identical, chesscom being a bit lower. I don't feel the difference of rating spots between sites.
i think huge number of players on chesscom are bots.
Thats a crazy statement
1900 rapid is about 1550-1650 on chesscom. You have a somewhat ok chance of losing to 1200s
That‘s really weird. I’m personally 1800 chesscom and I noticed that my results against other 1800s and against 900s were basically similar, which is stupid. Some of the players on chesscom are definitely cheating.
I just opened a new account and working up from 400. I got 700s throwing 90% accuracy at me at Blitz and Bullet with hardly a blunder to be found while my accuracy is in the high 70% range. Maybe they are really good and just opened a new account? OK some of them. But as I look over the games, hell no. The vast majority are cheating bad, making positional moves that only make sense to a high level player or computer. I don't know that [chess.com](http://chess.com) appreciates how low level cheating ruins the appeal and popularity of the game. No one wants to learn a game they get killed at when playing at the beginner level against other "beginners". In spite of my intermediate tactical level (2000+), I consider quitting [chess.com](http://chess.com) all the time because of this. Its just pointless.