How to REALLY improve at chess?

I have tried everything from books to herbs to drugs but nothing helps. After playing about 20,000 games on Playchess, another 14000 at another chess site and about 3000 here I am unable to improve any further.

Trust me, chess is my greatest passion in life and I want to improve at any cose Damn it I do a job only so that I can buy the best chess books otherwise I would quit my job and play chess 24X7.

Hello @pdve,

I had the same problem a year or two ago. I had improved a lot in the beginning but couldn't keep getting better. I became frustrated and my rating started to decline. However, I found that my problem was in three things:

1. My attitude playing chess
2. My inability to analyze games well
3. My lack of proper middlegame strategy

Make sure that you only play serious games if you are in a good mood. I have found that if you play in a bad mood (especially after a bad loss), you can be affected and play poorly as a result.

Also, analyzing games is a very important way to improve. Study grandmaster games from chessgames.com (make sure they are in the openings that you play). Here's a study guide on how to analzye such games: http://chesswinning.com/how-to-analyze-chess-games/

Lastly, a lot of <2000 rated players suffer from strategic inaccuracies in the middlegame and endgame. Chess books can really help with the theory that you should apply to your games. Here's a list of seven chess books that are really great (I would recommend you check out the ones regarding the middlegame and endgame): http://chesswinning.com/7-best-chess-books/

Best of luck,

mocl125

"... Just because a book contains lots of information that you don’t know, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it will be extremely helpful in making you better at this point in your chess development. ..." - Dan Heisman (2001)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140626180930/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/heisman06.pdf
Possibly of interest:
Simple Attacking Plans by Fred Wilson (2012)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708090402/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review874.pdf
http://dev.jeremysilman.com/shop/pc/Simple-Attacking-Plans-77p3731.htm
Logical Chess: Move by Move by Irving Chernev (1957)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708104437/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/logichess.pdf
The Most Instructive Games of Chess Ever Played by Irving Chernev (1965)
https://chessbookreviews.wordpress.com/tag/most-instructive-games-of-chess-ever-played/
Winning Chess by Irving Chernev and Fred Reinfeld (1949)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708093415/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review919.pdf
Back to Basics: Tactics by Dan Heisman (2007)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708233537/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review585.pdf
https://www.chess.com/article/view/book-review-back-to-basics-tactics
Discovering Chess Openings by GM John Emms (2006)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140627114655/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen91.pdf
Openings for Amateurs by Pete Tamburro (2014)
http://kenilworthian.blogspot.com/2014/05/review-of-pete-tamburros-openings-for.html
https://chessbookreviews.wordpress.com/tag/openings-for-amateurs/
https://www.mongoosepress.com/catalog/excerpts/openings_amateurs.pdf
Chess Endgames for Kids by Karsten Müller (2015)
https://chessbookreviews.wordpress.com/tag/chess-endgames-for-kids/
http://www.gambitbooks.com/pdfs/Chess_Endgames_for_Kids.pdf
A Guide to Chess Improvement by Dan Heisman (2010)
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708105628/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review781.pdf
Studying Chess Made Easy by Andrew Soltis
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708090448/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review750.pdf
Seirawan stuff:
http://seagaard.dk/review/eng/bo_beginner/ev_winning_chess.asp?KATID=BO&ID=BO-Beginner
https://web.archive.org/web/20140708092617/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/review560.pdf
https://www.chess.com/article/view/book-review-winning-chess-endings
https://web.archive.org/web/20140627132508/http://www.chesscafe.com/text/hansen173.pdf
http://www.nystar.com/tamarkin/review1.htm

pdve - I don't think I play any better than you, but I think we both stress things that the other would benefit from.

You play a lot of games (I should be playing more rapid or longer-time-limit games), but doing 784 tactics problems in 5 years isn't learning patterns or studying tactics as much as you should. I came back to chess this year after being away since 2000 as a club-level OTB player, a 2116 USCF correspondence player (from the pre-home-computer 1970's), and a very successful high school chess team coach.  In 2017 I successful did 1183 of 1435 chess.com Tactic Trainer problems and 1412 of 2169 at chesstempo.com, and I go over every problem, right or wrong, and determine the tactics and patterns I saw of should have seen and make sure I know them by name as listed here:

https://www.chess.com/article/view/chess-tactics--definitions-and-examples

https://chesstempo.com/tactical-motifs.html

I also look for how these are used:

https://chesstempo.com/positional-motifs.html

It has brought my tactics rating to 1742 (a high of 1779) from hovering around the 1500's early this year over at chesstempo where their rating alcgorithm is more consistent.  I see a definite improvement in pattern recognition in my games:

"..., you have to make a decision: have tons of fun playing blitz (without learning much), or be serious and play with longer time controls so you can actually think.
One isn’t better than another. Having fun playing bullet is great stuff, while 3-0 and 5-0 are also ways to get your pulse pounding and blood pressure leaping off the charts. But will you become a good player? Most likely not.
Of course, you can do both (long and fast games), ..." - IM Jeremy Silman (June 9, 2016)
https://www.chess.com/article/view/longer-time-controls-are-more-instructive

When I was below 2000, I mostly played, but when I got stuck, I'd read a book and start improving again.

However it has to be a good book (I've read books that don't really help) and you have to study it (it's not enough to just read pages, you have to set up a board and analyze things for yourself too).

One book in each of the following areas: tactics, endgame, opening, strategy, annotated game collection.

Do that and play long tournament length games (and analyze every game you play whether it's long or blitz) then you should be able to keep improving.

If you do all this and still get stuck, then it's probably time to get a coach.

The Ancient Greek aphorism "know yourself" was inscribed in the forecourt of the Temple of Apollo at Delphi and for good reason. 

Find out about yourself.  Do you prefer closed, semi or open games, are you losing your games in the opening, middle or endgame? Are you too reckless? Play aimless one move attacks? Moves with no planning or purpose?  Are you too timid failing to capitalize on the initiative? Do you sharpen the position when you have no real reason to do so? Do you ignore your opponents threats?  Are you tactically and positionally aware? Can you read the chessboard so as to identify the critical elements?  Honestly find out about yourself you will be amazed.

Let's point out mistakes you shouldn't make first :

-Avoid playing bullet. They are terrible for your chess and you won't learn what is important in a position you'll react to mostly ghost threats (Threats that are non existent if watched upon carefully).

-Not analyzing your games

What helped me to improve :

-I recently started to play correspondance games and I noticed that they are actually insanely good for your chess. And the reason is simple, you get to calculate a lot of different moves and you absolutely need to find a plan according to your position in order to win a game or to draw it.

Play 3 or 4 games at a time with 1 to 3 days a move and calculate, seek for all candidate moves and try to find the continuation.

-Choose openings. Try to master a small amount of openings before going into other systems.

As white : I very highly suggest playing the Colle system as white, since it's a very viable opening and very easy to setup and there are very little counters in the opening leaving you less prone to extremely bad moves + the two bishops will work very nicely.

As black : I think avoid playing sicilian since it requires quite a lot of general knowledge of positions and can often lead you to play a game in which the king may stay in the center too much. I suggest to play Queens' indian as a starter against D4, and E5 against E4

This is a nice topic. 

I believe steady effort pays off, but you might want to make your own strategy in going about it. 

I also believe there are MANY ways to improve at chess. For instance, I used to play blitz on Chesscube, analyze instructional parts of games (whether it is opening, strategy or, most of all, tactics) afterword, save it into Chessbase, move the analysis to my phone, and look at it during my spare time. It helped a lot. 

I think it's just a case of working smart and hard, but I'm only FIDE 1900 at the moment, so... 

 Yep, a crucial aphorism. +1

I provided several quotes from a world champion that answers this question here.

Hmm

Another post started close to 3 years ago and resumed a day ago . . .

Well, maybe you're as good as you'll ever get. We all have our limits. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that, either; we all have our strengths and weaknesses.

You're still going strong after all this time and doing reasonably well. Good luck.

Do puzzles, openings, middle games and endgame

https://chessmood.com/courses spend your day in chessmood with grandmasters and feel your growth day by day like me

But that cost money

Two words: Tac, Tics.

https://lichess.org/training

I speak from my personal experience, no theory. (I tried to improve my rating by studying any chess element, and failed, and then I started solving puzzles on lichess, and suddenly my rating got a 100+ points higher... I also didn't analyze my games).

First, you need to make sure that your chess-character (Aggressve, Solid and Positional, etc.), suits your opening repertoire. I was playing 1.e4 as White, all my life, because ChessMaster - the program, usually teaches the Ruy Lopez. But, I'm a solid, positional player, and am now slowly and carefully switching do 1.d4. To systems, rather then openings.

I made a training program to myself - every morning I solve 10 puzzles (no more, no less). permanence is obviously the way to improve.

I see that your rating in Rapid, is 1800+. That's a lot. In Lichess my Rapid rating in 2000+, in here, it's 1700+. Players in here are by far stronger, do know that.

"I have tried everything from books to herbs to drugs",

books...?

NO! no books! books will make you a Nerd! (perhaps even a geek) (people Do like it a lot, when I preach them about how to handle their personal lives, going into details, so I thought I'd mention that).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EtdifpdnCAQ

You mentioned herbs, that's great - I like celery, coriander, and parsley!

According to GM Ron Henley (I saw 2 Youtube videos - about the Dutch & the London), studying openings and tactics - puzzles, are the way to improve.

One last word:

In order to Really improve, you really need a coach (I don't mean watching GM videos, I mean a person who knows you personally, that you are his pupil / student). Another person, is seeing your flaws far more easily than You can. (because a person loves himself, and he can hardly watch himself from outside objectively). Also, a smarter or more experienced person can teach you a lot (especially an elder). and he can give you something that suits you personally, because he knows you.. personally (unlike, good hearted, GMs and IMs on Youtube or such - which can only give a General direction. as discussed).

Farewell, au revoir.
 
 

I recently came to a conclusion, that in order to Really improve in chess, you need to:

1. Get good in tactics. (lichess is good, because the puzzles are computer-made (it makes it more real), and you can choose a level).

2. You have to confuse your opponent: Either play 1. b6 or 1. g6 (as White, as Black you need to choose sidelines which are rare, and you like them, computer analysis doesn't matter that much -  you don't play with masters). then you'll see how your knowledge, creativity, talent, come into effect - they're all memorizing openings, that's why they win. here's a game of mine. look at his queen, look at his clock.

https://lichess.org/study/vUBQHHpZ/K2rSNz3R

(chapter 3)

According to our rating, we are the same level... do you really think we are? It's my very first 1.b6 game ever... Tactics, middlegame ideas / plans, endgames, and most imporantly - throw him off the openings book (you don't need the book either, you know opening principles...).

Have fun! (you will, trust me)

For middle-game ideas / plans, it's good to learn some 1.d4 openings / systems, on Youtube videos, (not to necessarily play d4,  and in this exact order, I'm an e4 player and now I played b6...), you write in Google, for example, "colle zukertort middlegame plan", and GMs Susan Polgar and Simon Williams are ready to explain the ideas for you... easy.

Besides, personal opinion: your rating on the internet doesn't matter much (it's higher than it looks) because there are Way too many cheaters. I think that the best anti-cheating server is ICC.