The Short Answer
Quick answer: Lichess uses the Glicko-2 system, not Elo. Every new player starts at 1500 with a huge margin of doubt, so early games move your rating by a lot. That margin shrinks as you play and grows when you stop. A question mark means the rating is still provisional.
I read the rating answers in the Lichess FAQ. Then I checked the Lichess code that holds its rating settings.
Below is what each part means for your own number, in plain words.
Glicko-2, Not Elo
Most people know chess ratings through Elo, the system FIDE still uses for over the board play.
Lichess runs Glicko-2 instead. Mark Glickman, a statistician, designed it, and his Glicko-2 paper explains the maths.
The big idea is simple. Elo gives you one number. Glicko-2 gives you a number plus a measure of how sure the system is about it, called the rating deviation.
There's a third value too, the volatility. It tracks how erratic your results are. If you swing between great days and bad days, it rises.
Our guide to the Elo rating system covers the older method, if you want to compare.
You Start at 1500, With a Huge Margin
Every new account starts at 1500. That number on its own tells you very little.
The FAQ describes a new rating as 1500 plus or minus 1000. In other words, the system is 95 percent sure your real strength is somewhere between 500 and 2500.
It calls that incredibly uncertain, and it is. A total beginner and a strong club player both start at the same number.
The code shows one small trick here. For your very first pairing, Lichess treats you as 1450, a virtual rating. A comment in the code says this makes the expected score 50 percent without changing the real starting rating.
Why New Ratings Jump So Much
Because the system knows so little about you at first, every early game teaches it a lot.
The FAQ says a new player's rating can change dramatically, potentially by several hundred points at a time. Win a few games in a row, and you can shoot up fast. Lose a few, and you can drop just as fast.
There's a limit, though. The code caps the change from any single game at 700 points.
So don't panic about your first ten games. A big swing early on is the system doing its job, not a sign that you're playing badly or well.
The Margin Shrinks as You Play
Each rated game gives the system more evidence about you.
The FAQ says that after some games against established players, the margin narrows. Then the points you gain or lose per game get smaller too.
The deviation never reaches zero. In the code, the smallest it can go is 45.
That's why an active player's rating feels steady. If you play every day, a single win moves you far less than it did in your first week.
A new account works the other way. Its big margin means one game can move it by a lot. That's also why playing an opponent with a provisional rating can feel like a gamble.
Why Taking a Break Changes Things
Here's a part that surprises a lot of players.
Your margin doesn't stay fixed while you're away. The FAQ says it grows as time passes. When you come back, your rating can move faster again, so it can catch up with any change in your skill.
The code shows how fast that happens. A comment says the setting was chosen so a typical player's deviation goes from 60 to 110 in one year.
So if you return after a long break and your first few games swing your rating more than usual, that's expected. It settles again once you've played a while.
What the Question Mark Means
Sometimes you'll see a rating with a question mark next to it, like 1500?. That means the rating is provisional.
The FAQ gives two reasons. The player hasn't finished enough rated games against opponents of similar strength in that category, or they haven't played enough recent games.
In exact terms, the question mark appears when the deviation is greater than 110.
The FAQ adds that it might take around a year of inactivity for a rating to become provisional again, depending on how many games you've played.
So a question mark on your opponent's rating means that number could be far off. Treat it as a rough guess.
One Rating for Each Time Control
You don't have one Lichess rating. You have one for each speed and each variant.
Lichess decides the speed of a game with a formula. It takes the starting clock time in seconds and adds 40 times the increment.
The FAQ uses 5+3 as its example. Five minutes is 300 seconds, plus 40 times 3, which makes 420 seconds. That counts as blitz.
Here are the cut offs:
- UltraBullet: up to 29 seconds.
- Bullet: up to 179 seconds.
- Blitz: up to 479 seconds.
- Rapid: up to 1499 seconds.
- Classical: 1500 seconds or more.
So a 3+2 game is blitz, not bullet, because its increment pushes it to 260 seconds.
Floors, Ceilings and Special Starts
The code also sets a few hard limits.
No Lichess rating can fall below 400 or rise above 4000. So if you see a 400, that player is sitting on the floor.
Not everyone starts at 1500, either. Students invited to a Lichess class start at 800, with a smaller margin of 400. Lichess classes are built for teachers and their pupils.
Bot accounts start at 3000. A note in the code says a bot account is usually a Stockfish instance.
How to Get on the Leaderboard
The Lichess leaderboards have strict entry rules. The FAQ lists four.
You must have played at least 30 rated games in that rating. Your last rated game in it must be within the past week. Your deviation must be lower than 75 in standard chess, or lower than 65 in variants. And you must be in the top 10.
The weekly rule exists so that players who stop using their accounts drop off the list.
That also means a top 10 spot isn't permanent. Stop playing for a week, and you leave the board, even if your rating stays the same.
Rating Refunds From Cheaters
Lose to a cheater on Lichess, and you can get your points back automatically.
The FAQ explains how. One minute after a player is marked for cheating, Lichess looks at their 40 latest rated games from the last 5 days. If you lost rating to them, through a loss or a draw, you get a refund.
There are conditions. Your rating can't have been provisional at the time. The refund is also capped, based on your peak rating and how your rating moved after the game.
In any case, a single refund never goes above 150 points.
Points That Don't Come Back
Not every unfair loss gets a refund.
The FAQ is direct about lag. If you lose a game because of lag or a dropped connection, Lichess won't give the points back. That's true even when the problem was on their side, which it says is very rare.
There's one exception. If Lichess itself restarts and you lose on time because of it, the game is aborted, so you don't lose rating.
The practical lesson is easy. Don't play rated games on a weak connection. A casual game costs nothing if your internet drops halfway through.
Why Lichess Ratings Look High
Many players notice that their Lichess rating is higher than their rating elsewhere.
The FAQ's answer is not to compare. It says ratings aren't absolute numbers. Different sites have different players and different formulas, and both of those change the numbers.
It suggests thinking of a rating as a relative figure. Within one pool, the gap between two players tells you who's likely to win. Saying you're rated X means little outside that pool.
If you still want a rough guide, our post on the Chess.com vs Lichess rating difference compares the two sites. Our FIDE vs Chess.com rating guide covers over the board ratings.
How to Use Your Lichess Rating
Your rating is a tool for finding fair games. It isn't a grade.
Watch the trend over a month, not the result of one evening. Glicko-2 makes short swings normal, especially after a break.
If you find the number distracting, the FAQ says you can hide ratings during play. Turn on Zen mode in the display settings, or press z during a game.
Then put the energy into your play. At club level, fewer blunders and better known openings are two good places to start. Our opening trainer lets you drill your lines until they stick, so your games start on ground you know.