Does the value of ratings change over time?

Has the value of ratings on chess.com and other leagues increased, decreased, or stayed around the same over time? For example, would a 1600 rating 10 years ago be equivalent to a 1600 rating today, or would it be different?

Does anyone know?

A lot of people believe that ratings are slowly inflating (so a 1600 rating isn't worth what it used to be)... but this is hard to prove or disprove.

It's a really interesting question.

At lower ratings, I believe the value has increased on chess.com. I saw an old topic where there was a screenshot of the average blitz rating. It was like... 1050 or something. Now it's a little below 1000.

Looking at Hikaru's rating graph, even though his FIDE is relatively unchanged, his chess.com has gone up 300-400 points over the last 5 years. Some of that may be due to more top players joining, but this suggests that for higher rated players the rating had decreased in value.

Any chess site that rates me at 2350 simply MUST be using inflated ratings.

Ok but lets be honest:  you've played less than 100 games and you haven't played any games in over a year.

Plus it's common knowledge that daily ratings are inflated to begin with.

I'm not trying to be disrespectful, just saying what we all know.

OTB tournament ratings are by far the most respectable, both IMO and for most people I think.

As for chess.com ratings things like puzzles and lessons tend to be really overrated. Daily tends to be pretty overrated. Live games tend to be better. I tend to look at blitz.

But even with blitz, old people are bad and might be a few 100 underrated while young kids are good and can be a few 100 overrated.

That's how I see it.

Back when I played OTB, my published rating fluctuated between 1950 and 2050.

But that was thirty years ago, or more. I've learned a lot since then... but then again, perhaps advancing senility has turned my brain to porridge. Hard to say whether I'm stronger or weaker than I was back then.

Also low rated people tend to suffer in blitz, and high rated people are overrated in comparison to OTB.

For example I can imagine an earnest 1000 USCF player being rated around 800 or even closer to 500 in blitz here.

But for top players they're all over 3000 meanwhile their FIDE is "only" 2700-2800.

IMO chess.com blitz is pretty accurate for middle range players as long as their age isn't very high or low, and as long as they don't play an excessive amount of (or nearly none) blitz.

As they say, growing old isn't for the faint of heart.

Calculation suffers while wisdom grows. That's how I see it.

Groucho Marx was fond of pointing out that growing old isn't so bad when you consider the alternative.

Haha

In my experience old people may or may not be very quick witted, but when they speak it's good to be quiet and listen.

I've already got my dying words all picked out.

I'm going to say "Either this wallpaper goes, or I do!" And then I'll die.

It's good to have something prepared.

Haha