Internet rating vs OTB rating

Hi,

I play for a good two to three years now, solely on the Internet on different sites. I just started for fun, not with high ambitions (I'm 29 already). But I get more and more fascinated by it the deeper my understanding becomes. So I will check out a chess club nearby and maybe start to play tournaments to see how I do. A dream would be actually to reach an ELO of 2000 one day (not sure if that's realistic by any means).

Well, my question is how realistic the chess.com rating is compared to an OTB rating. Anyone plays live tournament chess and can share his thoughts? If I have 1600 on chess.com, can I expect something similar in live OTB chess? Or is it way off? Or could it be even higher, because I almost exclusively play 15/10 rapid? I still am low on time often though, so my classical chess would be eventually higher rated?

Add 200 points on your blitz rating and you'll have your Otb rating.

Nope.

IM Jeremy Silman says the chess.com ratings are 200-300 points higher than their OTB USCF (similar to FIDE) equivalents. I, seeing players here, having played OTB and Tournament Directed USCF OTB Tournaments, agree with Silman. Look at the %age ranks listed here on chess.com and the percentages listed on this 2004 USCF OTB graph (I couldn't find a newer one, this should still be roughly accurate) and Silman seems to be right:

I'd say Blitz ratings here are probably more reliable. (Unless you're really bad at this time control.) Chess.com's standard ratings are somewhat overrated. So with 1300 Blitz and 1600 standard you might be rated Elo 1400...

My chess.com rating at daily chess, is approximately 200 highere than my ELO rating.

It all depends. I'm rated 1555 OTB USCF. I don't play a ton of Live but my blitz is 1352 and rapid is 1479. So, of the two, rapid is closer to my OTB rating. Obviously, Silman's idea is wrong in my case, or Live time controls, but I could either be an outlier, haven't played a sufficient number of games, there really isn't a ton of correlation between online and OTB, or his generalization only holds true for certain rating ranges. 

My Daily, is closer to Silman's estimation, but has been farther from that in the past, on the high end.

Of course, I'm horrible at blitz and a bit better at longer time controls. My blitz stats have me winning 34.8% of games and in rapid I win 51%. OTB, I'm at a 51.6% score on regular ratings (overall results), 50.5% for Quick (includes many dual rated games) and in my minimal OTB blitz games, 45.8%.

That depends. I'd say there isn't much more than a superficial connection. I am currently rated 1900+ Elo OTB and usually play at 1900-2100 Elo standard OTB. Here I had a 2000+ blitz rating for a time, then I played when sick, early in the morning, late at night, while on the phone, eetc etc etc. Other may do likewise. If I seriously go in for playing concentrated blitz on here I can bring the rating back up to 2000. I think. Many don't play like that here.

Depends when Silman wrote it. Chess.com ratings have been changed by the site a few times over the years.

Also, of course, the sentence "chess.com ratings are 200-300 points higher . . ." is completely meaningless because there are many categories of time controls, some are well known to be very inflated, some have been deflated through the years.

It also depends on the person's ability and activity. If they rarely play OTB, or rarely play blitz, then even if you averaged the gap for all people who play both, it wouldn't necessarily be accurate for the guy who is inactive. It also depends on the player's seriousness, if they're trying out new openings, playing drunk etc.

Blitz is pretty close though. I think most people are + or - one to two hundred. The handful of people near my rating I know OTB who play here have blitz ratings 50 to 100 points higher than their OTB rating.

If Blitz rating is indeed close to OTB, then I would agree (judging from scores I got from several online sites).

Yeah, go with the flow.

Too true.

It's interesting to see that the rating systems are so completely different.  Being in the top 5% of USCF players is about 1950.  Being in the top 5% of on Chess.com is around 1700.  Does that compensate for OTB players being a "stronger" set of players?  Are they stronger?  I'm not sure how to compare the two sets.  If we compare distribution graphs, that might tell us something.  Looking at the scholastic distribution shows these young people have terrible ratings.  The non scholastic players are a much stronger group.  How would that compare to club players?  I'm guessing that most chess.com players fall into the club player category.  

The scholastic distribution is because there are just so many kids who have played a couple tournaments and then stopped, or are under ten years old etc. The percentage of experts and masters who are kids is going up every year. At 20, I’m already usually a good bit older than the median age if I play my section or the open section of a tournament. 

My Daily rating here is 1687 and my ECF grade is 130 which translates to 1675 FIDE so reasonable parity there. My actual FIDE grade is 1551 as half the games of mine in the current period are losses incurred in the Summer of 2018 at the British Seniors Championship during the heatwave at the venue and in my hotel room. Although these games in included in my ECF grade they are offset by wins and draws in the London Chess League and the Central London Chess League.

Ignore your online rating and trust your OTB rating when you get one. I'd actually trust an ECF f grade more than an online grade.

My ecf is 131 which is about 1683 FIDE apparently whereas my online hovers around 1500. Although I play a lot better OTB than online which is usually the reverse for most people (especially the young).

OTB is all that matters. 

Ratings are generally a good indication of how well you do in the context they arise.

Everyone likes to believe the accurate rating measurement is the one which gives him the highest score. Online people play against people all around the globe. OTB there can be bubbles.