ELO converter: Chess.com, FIDE and Lichess conversion

Do you want to know how your chess rating compares to the ratings you see on Lichess or Chess.com or in FIDE tournaments? Use my simple chess elo converter for Chess.com to Lichess elo conversion, Lichess to Chess.com, both to FIDE, and so forth.

This week’s challenge: gain as much rating as possible for free within the 7 day free trial period of a Chess.com Diamond membership. (Average community result so far: 173 elo increase.) Read more.

Chess ratings are not the same everywhere because different organizations use slightly different rating systems. Even though everybody uses an elo system, the start rating for new players differ, and the elo calculations may differ slightly.

And the player pools are different. For example, the people that play over the board chess tournaments are more serious than the online players. So if you play in over the board tournaments, your opponents are stronger.

New chess players often want to know their ‘real’ chess rating. But your ‘real’ chess rating doesn’t exist. There’s no golden standard. So you can’t convert your chess.com rating to a ‘real rating’, you can only convert it to your Lichess rating or your FIDE rating for example.

Some players think that your online chess rating matters less than you over the board rating, but I disagree. Of course you have some advantages online (your opponent leaves or disconnects sometimes), but you also have the same disadvantages (you disconnect or are distracted while you play). So online chess rating is just as real as over the board to me.

Chess.com ratings are generally about 400 points lower than Lichess ratings. The main reason for this is that on Chess.com new players start at 1200 elo, and on Lichess new players start at 1500 elo. This is true for both Blitz and Rapid.

Chess.com ratings are about 200 points higher than your FIDE rating would be. This is because FIDE players take chess more serious than online players. When you play online, you always have a percentage of opponents that resign or lose internet connection, which are free elo points.

Chess.com ratings are about 100-200 elo points higher than USFC ratings on average. This is because USFC chess players take chess more seriously than the average Chess.com player, so the player pool is stronger in USFC.

Your Lichess rating is typically 600 points higher than your FIDE rating. This huge different is caused because on Lichess nw players start with more rating points, and the competition is softer than in FIDE.

Your online chess rating is usually a few hundred points higher than your OTB (over the board) rating. That’s because it takes a much more serious kind of chess player to travel to an over the board chess tournament, compared to just playing online. How much your internet and OTB ratings differ exactly depends on the organizations in which you play.

Your Blitz rating is usually a few hundred points lower than your rapid rating. This is because the player pool in Blitz is much stronger (because typically only experienced players enjoy playing Blitz). However, this effect could be reversed if you happen to be much better at Blitz than at Rapid chess because you’re such a fast thinker.

Your rapid rating is usually a few hundred points higher than your bullet rating in chess. The reason is the same as why your Blitz rating is lower than your rapid: only experienced players play bullet, so the pool is stronger.

Your classical chess rating would be a few hundred points lower than your rapid chess rating is. This is because the player pool for classical chess is very strong. Because casual players don’t enjoy spending multiple hours on a single chess match.

Also read: Chess Rating Percentile Calculator and Distribution Graph (for different chess websites and organizations)

Also read: Chess Rating to IQ Calculator – Does Chess Increase IQ?

Also read: Best Chess Books: Top Picks for Every Skill Level