There isn’t a single chess player out there who enjoys losing. Everyone wants to improve at chess and start winning. It’s a constant struggle – some players succeed, but many don’t. I’m sure you’re a well-motivated player aiming for success and failure isn’t an option for you.
It doesn’t matter if you are an advanced player or just starting out. Today we will go over the five most effective ways to dramatically improve at chess.
1. Improve at Chess by Finding the Right Environment
Finding a place where you can get together with other chess enthusiasts, play some games, discuss ideas and share training secrets should be at the top of your list. Surrounding yourself with helpful and supportive people is already half of the battle for improving your chess.
Ideally, you want to communicate with those who know significantly more about the game than you. At the same time, they should not be on a totally different level. If you are 1200 rated, you shouldn’t look for a 2700 rated GM to teach you how to play an isolated pawn position or execute a “windmill”. They’ll be able to help you, but the process will be inefficient because most likely they don’t remember what it’s like to be a 1200 player. They would take some ideas and skills for granted, when it may actually be totally new to you.
The best bet would be finding a player 400-500 points higher rated than you, and learning from them by playing chess, analyzing games, etc. Spending time with those higher rated players will help you tremendously at making progress, because you’ll get exposed to their way of thinking, planning and making decisions. Ask specific questions about why certain moves were played, why it’s a good or bad move, or why you need to trade queens in certain positions.
Don’t just come to them asking “teach me some chess”, you have private coaches for that matter. If you can challenge them in a game, show good sportsmanship regardless of the outcome and demonstrate how motivated you are to succeed they will definitely go over the game with you and maybe teach you a thing or two. This is a very important first step to improve at chess.
2. Improve at Chess by Focusing on the Fine Details
Focusing on fine details is where most amateur chess players struggle. They don’t realize that chess is about paying attention to small things first. Club players readily ruin their pawn structure during minor piece exchanges, awkwardly position their knight on the rim of the board and lose tempi for no reason.
They think that those things are not as important as losing material or getting checkmated and this is true. However, once your opponent accumulates many small advantages, bigger consequences will follow. That means he will be able to obtain a positional advantage, which in turn will lead to a strong initiative and eventually you will suffer material losses. There is an old saying that perfectly describes this situation:
Don’t let that happen in your game! Take care of the small things and you will notice how your chess quickly improves.
3. Improve at Chess by Raising Your Tolerance for Routine Tasks
No chess player likes doing the routine things. It is more fun to play chess instead of solving tactics or working on theory. However, if winning is really important to you, this is a good time to rethink your priorities. That means you need to start spending more time on what helps you actually win chess games.
Playing chess is only the tip of the iceberg. The majority of the work lies far beneath. That includes all the things many chess players are not willing to do: tactics, opening preparation, studying endgames, game analysis, and so forth. If you want to achieve what others can’t, you should simply do what others won’t. That includes working on those boring, routine things, instead of playing casual games with your friends. Start today and improve at chess!
4. Improve at Chess by Choosing Quality over Quantity
Regardless of what you are doing, choosing quality over quantity is a winning strategy. Chess is no exception. Have you noticed how most chess players try to solve tactics? They stare at the position for 20 seconds and immediately start shuffling pieces. There is no clear plan, nor did they find any tactical ideas. They simply saw a move that they think “will work” and try it right away. If it’s wrong, they’ll keep trying until they get it right. Unfortunately, you cannot do that in a real game. You have only got one chance to play the move and, if it’s a bad one, you’re in trouble.
The point I’m trying to make is very simple.
Rather than solving 10 or 20 tactical puzzles badly it is much better to solve just 5-7 fully understanding the ideas and going over all of the variations. Instead of spending just 20 seconds per problem, it is much better to spend 3-5 minutes. During that time you can analyze candidate moves, find the best continuation and even double check yourself. Give it a try here.
That’s exactly the process you should use in over-the-board chess. The concept of “quality” is applicable to anything you study: endgames, middlegames or opening preparation. It is best to reduce the load and increase the depth, rather than study everything shallowly. We don’t want to be the kind of chess player that knows everything about nothing. If you really want to improve at chess, you should always keep the “quality over quantity” principle in mind.
5. Improve at Chess by Questioning Every Move
After every move played by your opponent, you should stop and ask this series of questions:
- What is the point of this move?
- Do I need to take immediate action?
- Is it a good or bad move and why?
Even if the move appears to be obvious you should still go through the same series of questions.
Why?
Because otherwise you won’t do it when it really matters. Chess players get used to tackling problems the same way. If you get used to stopping and thinking about each and every move, even the most obvious ones, you will do the same if the move is tricky. Otherwise you will just play on, without giving it much thought. The strategy of questioning each move is very effective. But it is only effective if you apply it every single time!
Give this method a try and you will be surprised how it will help you improve at chess!
