Edit: 2 weeks since I started; July 29th.
Also, to explain myself a little more: I want to avoid ELO because it gets me obsessed and often start playing rapidly and tilting and for something that goes up and down so easily it ends up making me feel crumby.
At your rating, progression is not linear in the slightest. You can have 2 500 rated players with completely different skills and knowledge sets... Maybe only one of them knows how to win with queen and king vs king, while the other one might not be aware of the fact that they can castle queen side. It's really a coin toss who you're up against because you are all beginners, and games are decided by wild, and almost at times completely random blunders instead of subtle difference in knowledge and improvement. Don't get too worried about your rating this early on; as long as you feel like you learn something new every day you're doing okay. Most importantly, have fun !
If you want to avoid worrying about your elo there are some chrome extensions out there that let you block the elo levels while you're playing, or replace elo levels with elo "tiers" like silver gold diamond ect.. like overwatch or CS.GO
I'd recommend spending time in the Learn section. Complete some Lessons, practice some Endgames, and complete some of the Drills in the Practice section. You'll increase your understanding without being graded on an Elo scale and your games will improve.
When playing games, you can challenge people to unrated games. Your opponents still have an Elo, and you can make a mental note of what it is. Over time, you can keep a mental tally of how you do against opponents of various Elos. I realize this is still Elo-based, but there is no risk of seeing the number on the website change.
Similarly, you can play against the computer and increase the difficulty over time. The computer opponents are still (sort of) Elo rated, but results against computer opponents don't affect your Elo score.
Thank you for the fantastic advice!
I think, adding to to this, I should stop playing rapid games for awhile and just do daily and the other things mentioned here in the meantime. Rapid has too fast a dopamine hit for me to not go wild and obsessive with it and get myself in trouble.
I'll start off with the positives I see in your stats:
Now, for the tips to help you get where you want to go:
Your rating will lag behind your skill level. As you get better, it will climb as well. Personally, I do not care about my online rating at all. The only rating I care about is my OTB classical rating. So anything else (even the OTB rapid and blitz ratings) are just for me to have fun. The classical games are my personal "final exams". If you are not playing OTB, then that mindset will not work for you, so find something else. For example, suppose you want to test your puzzle skills every month or so. Do the rated tactics trainer at the end of the month (say, 25 puzzles on the last day) and see how you do. Set a goal for the accuracy you want to hit and judge your improvement based on that (just an example).
What method are you using other then playing to get better at the game?
It is like a fat person being afraid of the scale.
You can only measure progress or lack of it by playing rated games.
It is like a fat person being afraid of the scale.
You can only measure progress or lack of it by playing rated games.
That isn't entirely accurate. If you are trying to lose weight, yes, you need to step on the scale. If someone is just trying to get fit, they might not lose a pound (that is called recomposition), so how would they measure progress then? There, you look in the mirror or judge if your pants are looser than they were before.
Rating only reflects your performance against the pool of players. It does not measure your knowledge nor skill. It will lag behind your actual improvement. And frankly, online you can play a ton and rack up rating points (especially in blitz and bullet) without making any improvement at all.
While I agree that playing is a must to develop that competitive mentality, it is not the only way to measure progress.
It is like a fat person being afraid of the scale.
You can only measure progress or lack of it by playing rated games.
I know a little about fitness and weight loss that's relevant here.
It is currently not recommend that people weigh frequently (like daily) for a similar reason I'm describing. Weight is highly volatile from day to day (and even throughout the day, try it out). People tend to get attached to the numbers they're seeing (it's just fundamentally how people work) and end up in a shame spiral that defeats their efforts. It also ignores that weight loss when done in a sustainable and healthy way, operates on a much longer time scale than get-skinny-fast schemes people write books about. A healthier way to do it is to either check in less frequently about your progress or - per PawnTsunami's point - find a different measure of progress (which is what I'm doing).
There's a ton of parallels there.
Sources (and why I say little): losing 20+ pounds recently (and am down a dress size or two), and having frequent discussions with my partner who studied to be a diet coach (as opposed to a diet couch which is furniture that's low in calories).
Context: I started chess a few weeks ago and have played about 200 games.
I've been frustrated with my lack of ELO progress (I'm guessing I've improved by about 100 points if you ignore the initial ELO) and I'm finding it discouraging . I know this is dumb and that three weeks is NOT enough time to make significant progress, but this is how I'm feeling.
At this point, how should I be measuring my progress? What are other metrics I can use?
Also, how fast of a progression of ELO should I be expecting?
In terms of how to actually get better, I got some great advice in one of my other threads.