How good is 1600 chess rating? It’s very impressive! Although, it depends on what kind of chess you play and where. Let me explain what I mean.
And I’ll also tell you how to easily get to 1600 chess rating if you’re willing to put in the work…
How good is a 1600 chess rating?
1600 chess rating is very impressive. You can show up to local chess tournaments and hold your own. And if you go to any bar or party, you’re pretty much guaranteed to be the best chess player there. But if you join a chess club, you could still learn a lot from the people there.
| Chess rating (elo) | Level | How you play |
| < 800 | Novice | You hang your queen 4 times per game |
| 800 – 1099 | Beginner | You play pretty well and then you blunder your queen. You know only 2 openings. |
| 1100 – 1399 | Intermediate | You can play all the common openings, but you blunder forks when you get tired. |
| 1400 – 1699 | Advanced intermediate | You don’t blunder pieces away anymore. If you lose it’s because you played inaccurately and you lost a pawn. |
| 1700 – 1999 | Advanced | People need to come at you with very challenging positions if they want you to make an inaccuracy. |
| 2000 – 2299 | Expert | You hold your own in almost any position. Your biggest enemies are stress and fatigue. |
Is 1600 elo a good chess rating?
1600 is a good chess rating on Chess.com but not on Lichess (where ratings are a few hundred points higher on average). 1600 elo is not quite a professional chess player yet, but it’s very good for a casual player.
Also read: Chess rating converter: Chess.com to Lichess to FIDE
What does a 1600 elo chess rating mean?
The math behind the elo rating system works out in such a way that every difference of 100 elo points corresponds to a 65% chance to win. So for example if a 1600 elo player plays against a 1500 elo player, the 1600 elo player has a 65% chance to win.
You can read what this means for you if you’re a 1600 elo rated player.
| Elo player 1 vs elo player 2 | Win chance for the 900 rated player |
| 1600 vs 1300 | 85% |
| 1600 vs 1400 | 75% |
| 1600 vs 1500 | 65% |
| 1600 vs 1600 | 50% |
| 1600 vs 1700 | 35% |
| 1600 vs 1800 | 25% |
| 1600 vs 1900 | 15% |
How many people have a 1600 chess rating?
Approximately 10 millions people in the world have a chess rating of 1600 or more on Chess.com. That’s about 16% of all chess players, and about 0.1% of all people on earth.
And about 3.5 million people have a chess rating between 1600 and 1699.
In the table below you can read what percentile of people have 1600 elo on Chess.com, Lichess, FIDE and USFC.
| Chess rating (elo) | Chess.com percentile | FIDE percentile | Lichess percentile | USFC percentile |
| 2000 to 2099 | 98% | 90% | 99% | 96% |
| 1900 to 1999 | 96% | 84% | 99% | 94% |
| 1800 to 1899 | 94% | 77% | 98% | 91% |
| 1700 to 1799 | 90% | 70% | 96% | 87% |
| 1600 to 1699 | 84% | 61% | 94% | 82% |
| 1500 to 1599 | 77% | 52% | 90% | 77% |
| 1400 to 1499 | 70% | 47% | 84% | 72% |
| 1300 to 1399 | 61% | 42% | 77% | 67% |
| 1200 to 1299 | 52% | 37% | 70% | 62% |
| 1100 to 1199 | 47% | 25% | 61% | 57% |
| 1000 to 1099 | 42% | 15% | 52% | 52% |
| 900 to 999 | 37% | 7% | 47% | 48% |
| 800 to 899 | 30% | 3% | 42% | 43% |
| 700 to 799 | 22% | 1% | 37% | 37% |
| 600 to 699 | 15% | 1% | 25% | 31% |
Also read: What is a Good Chess Rating? (with Percentile Calculator)
How long does it take to get to 1600 chess rating?
How long it takes to get 1600 chess rating depends on how smart you practice. Honestly, if you only play casual chess games without studying chess seriously, you probably won’t get to 1600 rating ever. Really. It’s that high.
But 1600 rating is easy to get if you study just a little bit. You can get to 1600 in 3 months if you just get a Chess.com Diamond membership and you analyze your games after you play them.
| Chess rating | How long to get this rating (with Chess.com Diamond) | How long to get this rating (without learning resources) |
| 1000 | 1 week | 2 months |
| 1100 | 2 weeks | 3 months |
| 1200 | 4 weeks | 6 months |
| 1300 | 6 weeks | 9 months |
| 1400 | 2 months | 1 year |
| 1500 | 2.5 months | 2 years |
| 1600 | 3 months | Probably never |
Also read: Chess.com Diamond Review: Is Chess.com Diamond worth it?
How to easily get to 1600 chess rating (and blow past it)
The easiest way to get to 1600 chess rating is to become a Chess.com Diamond member. This gives you everything you need to become 1600, even if you don’t buy any other chess courses.
In fact, I think you can gain 300 rating points within 2 weeks if this is the first time you’re using a Chess.com Diamond membership.
| Chess.com membership | Rating increase (within 2 weeks) |
| Basic (free) | +0 |
| Gold | +50 |
| Platinum | +100 |
| Diamond | +300 |
Why can you improve so much when you join the Diamond club?
Because you get a bunch of great study tools: game reviews, coach explanations, insights, lessons and puzzles.
| Chess study tool | Rating increase (within 2 weeks) |
| Playing games like normal | +0 |
| Chess puzzles | +25 |
| Chess lessons | +25 |
| Game review | +50 |
| Coach explanations | +100 |
| Insights | +100 |
These tools use artificial intelligence to analyze your chess games. They tell you for every move how good it was and what the best move would have been. And they even recommend lessons based on your common mistakes and playing patterns.
10 years ago only guys like Magnus Carlsen had access to this kind of technology. Now you can get it too. I’m confident this will have a huge impact on you and your chess rating. And you can even try it out for free for 7 days with the link below.
Get the Chess.com Diamond membership here (7 day free trial)