Will I be able to reach Master level?

umm...well according to USCF it's been 6 years since ur first tourney and you're around 1550. your chess.com ratings only disagree with your statement. 

and really people are different when it comes to going up quickly. some people might go 1000-1500 in a year where others might take 2. some can go 1400-1800 in a year and others never. but really i wouldnt consider it an acomplishment if you do that. 

a real acomplishment is getting to master a year from or so...normally it's just hard work that gets people higher faster

and to the OP i think anyone can make master, but some people just never put in the effort. i mean if someone reeeeeallly wanted to become master and they studied diligently they will become one soon enough. it's just a matter of time...

All the stats and anecdotes in the world won't answer the question. 

No, not everyone can become master even if they spend all their time studying. I've known some extremely bright individuals including lawyers, teachers, MBAs, who tried to become master after retiring from their professions. Not one of them actually made master, and only a handful broke 2000 despite spending more than 4 hours a day for several years trying. (And yes, several of them paid pretty pennies for GM lessons.)

The answer to the question still remains with you and how much you are willing to work. But even if you work diligently, you may not reach your goal. That intangible element, whether it's called "talent", "nature", "aptitude", "knack", "gift", "je ne sais quoi", or whatever, is also necessary.

So, the answer to the question remains: 

I don't know. 

Trapper4 wrote:

logozar wrote:

MorraMeister wrote:

ipcress12 - "A lot of people imagine they are hot sht because they can beat their uncle and the kids in the neighborhood. They have no idea of the trial by fire tournament play is even to reach class B."

I love this quote because I can relate. About 30 years ago I decided to attend my first OTB chess tournament. I was really assuming I was hot sh-t as I could beat all my friends and realtives easily. I also could play fairly well against a very old chess program named Sargon III on my commodore 64. I entered the tournament thinking I was probably a master player and just had not been discovered yet.

I played in a section with players ranging from about 1300 - 1500 or so, if I recall correctly. I got crushed. I went 0 for 5 rounds. It makes me laugh about it now, but back then it was a rather painful experience.

30 years later, i have read countless chess books, played tens of thousands of games, played over thousands of master games for study, used computers, coached chess clubs, been a tournament director and can beat probably about 98% of the humans walking on the face of the earth.

My point is the same as some of the earlier posts - my peak OTB rating so far has been about 1900. I don't think many of the newbies on here talking about being a master player have any idea just how up the ladder that really is. And how absolutely proud and satisfied you could be to make a rating of (say) 1700 or so. At that level - you would be a chess god to most people that walk on the planet.

Honestly I cant relate to that. I have gotten up from 1000 to 1700 in a year. Why does it take so long? 

umm...well according to USCF it's been 6 years since ur first tourney and you're around 1550. your chess.com ratings only disagree with your statement. 

and really people are different when it comes to going up quickly. some people might go 1000-1500 in a year where others might take 2. some can go 1400-1800 in a year and others never. but really i wouldnt consider it an acomplishment if you do that. 

a real acomplishment is getting to master a year from or so...normally it's just hard work that gets people higher faster

4 year break from chess (not serious). Then I get to 1590 from 1036 in less than a year. Almost 2500 tactics. And for my other ratings th only chess.com rating I take seriously is live standard and even that I don't do often. People who are stronger than me estimate me to be 1700 who know me, and I should get there soon.

I don't know either, but it is an interesting question.

I imagine most people can become decent class players with work, and as various posters have said, that's respectable.

Can anyone make it to master level: No

Even if they study and work very, very hard?: Still no

That about sums it all up.

How about if...: No, and stop pestering me!

anyone can make master if they are a future master.

I once read a GM, name forgotten, who said he thought anyone could make master if they put the work in, a lot of work.

I rather doubt it, but who knows.

I suspect the age you start also plays a large part.

Lasker believed that anyone could make master, but the Soviet Chess School disproved that thesis. Many thousands of players entered the Soviet Chess School, but very few became masters.

Having said that, I still like Yermo's story:

If you ask a Russian and an American whether they play chess, and they answer, "I play a little", it means two different things. When an American says it, he means he has learned the moves. When a Russian says that, he means he plays about 1800 strength!

logozar wrote:

4 year break from chess (not serious). Then I get to 1590 from 1036 in less than a year. Almost 2500 tactics. And for my other ratings th only chess.com rating I take seriously is live standard and even that I don't do often. People who are stronger than me estimate me to be 1700 who know me, and I should get there soon.

Well sorry to say bud but online ratings dont mean anything. And the reaosn you shot up so quickly is probably because you were playing on this site for 5 years...js

There is a belief that when Lasker said that, the average master was about the strength of todays 1800-2000 player. In this theory what Lasker said is actually quite true. If you think about it, todays 1800-2000 player was yesterdays 2000-2200.

I certainly have the impression a player with X rating today plays stronger than a player with X rating in the past.

However, has the curve shifted 200 points in 20 years? Or 400 points in 100 years?  Is there trustworthy software which demonstrates this?

Kenneth Regan, an IM and professional statistician, has shown there's been no inflation and only a very slight deflation of ratings since they were first introduced. 

FIDE's ratings have been surprisingly stable over time. It's possible to compare someone from 1970 to 2015 using the same rating system! (I know there are many who dispute this.)

Really? I played maybe a game every few months... at most... 

and when I got back my rating was the same... and I was still losing 1/3 games to my 750 USCF bro.

And online ratings mean nothing is my point! I dont take them seriously except Tactics, and Sorta C.M. and Live standard.

You shouldn't take tactic ratings too seriously, either. I've seen a couple of kids (billion tactics boy, for one...and his friend) with well over 3,000 tactical rating.

So, to make sure I've got it straight, a 1600 player from 1970 would play at a rating, say, of 1575 today?

I assume both paragraphs are about FIDE?

Any word on the stability of the USCF rating system?

Well, Regan focused on +2000. Iirc in 1970, the lowest FIDE rating was 2000. 

It's safer to say that someone rated 2785 today plays at about the same level as Fischer did in his prime. Well, except that once you bring up the name  Fischer, a faction of chess.com members go bonkers. Let's not mention Fischer. 

So, a player rated 2660 today would be about the same strength as Bent Larsen in 1971.

OK. I was checking that I got the sign right for the deflation. So 2200 rated player @ 1970 might play 2175 @ 2015?

Excellent interview with Dr. Regan here:

http://www.chess.com/blog/SamCopeland/an-interview-with-im-and-anti-cheating-expert-dr-ken-regan

Apparently they have established "intrinsic rating" software so they can compare players across time and this "intrinsic rating" matches FIDE ratings pretty solidly.

So it would seem to be a matter of time before this software is productized and becomes a feature in Chessbase.