Rating performance
A rating performance is the rating a player seems to have played at in one event, found by adding a score-based adjustment to the average rating of their opponents.
Also called: performance rating
Your rating is a long-run estimate. A rating performance, often called a performance rating, describes a single tournament. You take the average rating of your opponents and add or subtract a number that depends on your percentage score. FIDE publishes the conversion table for that number in clause 8.1.1 of its Rating Regulations and again in clause 1.4.9 of the Title Regulations.
At 50 percent the adjustment is zero, at 60 percent it is plus 72, at 75 percent plus 193, and at 90 percent plus 366. The table is antisymmetric, so a score of 40 percent subtracts 72. Performance rating matters most for title norms, where the Handbook sets the required level, such as 2600 for a Grandmaster norm, together with limits on the opponent mix.
It is a noisy statistic over nine games, so one hot event says little about your true strength. Use our performance rating calculator for the arithmetic, and read the entries on norm, K-factor and tiebreak.
Rating and title terms like "Rating performance" matter once you know your next step, and the improvement plans by rating band set out a weekly routine for each rating range.
Related terms
A norm is a tournament result that meets the FIDE title standard for performance rating and opponent mix; several norms across enough games can earn a title, but one norm alone does not.
A Grandmaster norm is a title performance of at least 2600 against opponents averaging at least 2380, in a qualifying event that meets the FIDE rules on opponent mix.
The K-factor is the multiplier in an Elo-style rating update that sets how many points a rating can move after a result; a larger K makes the rating react faster.
A tiebreak is a rule that ranks players who finish on the same score, either by a calculation from the results or by extra games, so that the final standings can be published.
A FIDE rating is the Elo-based number that the World Chess Federation publishes each month for players with rated games, with a published minimum of 1400, and it is the rating that FIDE titles are measured against.
Guides that go further
What a rating measures, how FIDE, Lichess, US Chess and chess.com compute theirs, and why the numbers differ.
Average chess rating and a good chess rating
What share of active Lichess players are rated above 800, 1200, 1500, 1800 or 2000, by time control.
Work out how a FIDE rating changes after a run of games.
Sources
- FIDE Handbook B.02 FIDE Rating Regulations, effective 1 March 2024, Clause 8.1.1, read Oct 21, 2026.
- FIDE Handbook B.01 FIDE Title Regulations, effective 1 January 2024, Clauses 1.4.8 and 1.4.9, read Oct 21, 2026.
Want to spot this in your own games?
A first lesson starts with your games: George reviews them and builds a study plan around what he finds.