How to get an Official ECF Online Rating

There are many benefits to having an English Chess Federation membership if you plan to play competitive chess. One of the lesser known perks is, you can play rated chess games through chess.com and Lichess.org. This means you can play rated events, from the comfort of your own home several nights per week and work on your development.

These games are Rated but not based on your online account rating and do not affect your standard over the board rating. If you play another ECF rated player online, in an ECF organised event, your ECF Online rating is what's used to calculate the rating increase or decrease, your chess/Lichess rating is irrelevant! These games are entered into the ECF ratings database in the same way as in person games and you can see your rating change on the 1st of each month. You will start at a base level and it will even out from there.

So your online Rapid Rating might be low if you play a lot of games and make mistakes trying out new strategies, but you could have a much higher rating if you focus on ECF rated games. This should be a good guide for you when you go to play in in person Rapid and Blitz events.

If you already have an ECF Membership. Search for the "English Chess Federation - Members" Club on either app, linked here for chess.com and also here on Lichess depending which you prefer. You will need to fill out a quick questionnaire and send them your membership number to be granted access.

Once in, they hold regular Rapid and Blitz tournaments through the week and you can get started on building up your ECF online rating.

If you don't yet have an ECF Membership, we would really recommend getting one if you plan to play in competitive tournaments and congresses. These start from £18 per year and can be found here. The main perk is you do not have to pay an extra charge when signing up for congresses and tournaments, but you also get a lot of free resources with this. We recommend getting the Gold level membership if you plan to play in 2 or more events in the year as without this you generally have to pay a bit extra to enter.

Remeber if you do join, select the Isle of Wight as your Chess club and you will be listed with the other players from Isle of Wight Chess Club.