How good is a 900 rating for someone who hasn't studied chess yet?

I pretty much started with a 200 or 300 rating after losing 60 or so games a few months ago because it was my first time playing chess. Now I am around a 900 rating after close to 800 games but I am stuck at this point. What do I do next or which books should I read to progress?

 

Also this is for blitz rating and not standard.

I agree...try longer time controls

my standard rating is 400 higher than my Blitz

try the chessmaster academy...also check out 1001 ultimate chess puzzles book by john Emms...boosted my OTB Rating by 500

I think it's a normal rating for someone who hasn't studied. And studying tactics is far more helpful at our level than reading prose (after you've read at least an introductory book on chess).

I agree with the above posters; you won't really learn anything substantial from just playing blitz.

hm.. I normally play 5 minute chess. I find it to be the most fun. However I've been stuck trying to reachc 1300... so close to it! you think playing like 10 min games will help improve my game?

Really take your time in correspondence chess. Try to analyze each move carefully and when you think you've found a good move look for a better one. Always look for why your opponent made their last move. Is there any immediate threat and if there look for the best way to meet that threat. Look at checks, captures and threats every move of every game and it will become automatic. Also do a lot of tactics puzzles and play opponents that are stronger than you are.

800 games is kind of a lot. You don't have to "study" chess per se, but if you learn from your mistakes, you really should be rated much higher after that many games. As others have pointed out, your biggest problem may be that you are playing blitz. I have played maybe 500 games of chess in my life, and look at my rating. I don't study much. But my biggest improvement happened when I put down chess books that I was told I'm supposed to read, and simply went over my games after I played them and looked for better moves in critical positions (computer analysis helps). Also when I decided to be persistent and consistent each move.

I think studying  chess just clutters your mind. Definitely not the right way to start chess. You need to play against better players and that gives enough experience to grow as long as you are observing the games closely. Then probably a point will come where you need to have precooked patterns in the mind so that you dont need to analyse your board all the time during a game. Thats where maybe study will help. But then if you are really good at observing games, you will build those patterns on your own anyway to an extent. I never studied chess myself, so I might be too naive in this comment. Maybe I am yet to reach that stage.

Wear that tactics trainer out.

I've been playing mostly 10 minute games for the past 2 months. They're fun and forces me to think quicker. But not as good with 5 miute games.

I just finished a standard 3 day game and loss because of that one mistake I didn't see endgame. I almost won though.

So study already!  Here's a link to 25 free Chess Mentor courses that are money back guaranteed to get you over 1000.  They're actually very well done.  Did I mention they're free?

http://www.chess.com/blog/webmaster/free-chess-mentor-courses

I'd say you need to learn following:

1. How to develop pieces. This is mainly natural development (i.e. where to place pieces).

2. Plans - General strategy. For example trying to get a mating attack. Also appreciating positional weaknesses

3. Combinative Vision - Basically seeing tactics and exploiting concepts like pins, skewers, discovered attacks etc

4. Endgames - I would strongly suggest to learn King + Pawn(s) endgames as that is foundation for rest.

More importantly you should enjoy yourself. If you want books then something like My System by nimzowitsch should give basics while
Questions ofModern Chess Theory by lipnitsky is probably more advanced for opening. For tactics you can use tactics trainer here or elsewhere but Attacking Manual 1 by Aagaard is also good along with book by Vukovic and Tal. For endgames I guess winning endgames by kosten or silman's complete endgame manual isn't a bad place to start. I also recommend to play stronger opponents and to go over your games and see where you want wrong so you can learn from your mistakes

 

Thanks for sharing your chess progress. Me personally I spent years at 600 playing on again and off again. So you are ahead of me back then. I think at 900 you still got to play more games and study alittle bit of basic strategy and know some tactical motifs. Don't go crazy with theory. Just play more at this point.

I put together a detailed guide on kind of what to expect at each elo level check it out.

From a 500 ELO Beginner to a 2000 ELO Expert

https://www.chess.com/forum/view/chess-players/from-a-500-elo-beginner-to-a-2000-elo-expert

Stop blitz completely and play Daily chess.
Analyse your games carefully, first without, later with an engine.
Go to Chessable and get some free books. One on basic endgames (important, because you will learn for example how to promote a pawn or how to force a draw if you are losing), three or four books on tactics, and a basic repertoire for white and black.
Use a database for your Daily games, otherwise you have no chance to win a game against stronger opponents, as you will blunder already in the first moves.

You have to practice everyday, and never NEVER forget to analyse a game.

Learn from the mistakes is a key to improvement. A quick blunder check is not enough (although it is better than nothing).

If you know somebody who plays decent chess, ask him for help in the analyses. Or find a weak player to analyse together, this is more fun than working alone.
Good luck!

Probably average. Age has a lot to do with it. If your a teenager or adult it's average. Lot's of people have a natural talent for looking at a chess board and can play reallly well against other people that know how to play chess but never studied anything.

Reminds me of when I was in the army, decades ago... the guy that ran the chess club on base said his goal was to make sure all the club members could beat "barracks chess", which was his slang for soldiers who didn't really play much chess, but memorized a few opening traps and could easily beat people that barely knew how to play chess.

To my experience, It's much tougher to beat most of 850...880 rated players than 940...960 rated players for some reason

idk bruh i have just learned chess for half year myself and I don't think I am good (my bitz rating is 920. )Check out my Games and u can see how bad am I. Always blunder pieces don't know why

i tested my elo and the test said 1500 but i am 300