Tools used: basic plotting with ChatGPT, finishing touches in Figma
Intersting to see how high it will really push, does anyone know what a realistic ceiling would be?
Unfortunately Elo doesn’t really work as a system at that insane level and with so few “competitors” (ie other computers) at a similar strength. Yes, computers are much better than humans. Trying to put a number on how much better is pretty futile.
Just to say, 1700 is a pretty decent player – it says “intermediate human” but a 1700 player would still beat anyone who doesn’t play regularly.
The labels of Intermediate Human and Novice Human are a bit weird — a 1700 FIDE player plays a lot of serious chess.
Still pretty good considering the human brain does chess, visual processing, and controlling the rest of a human body at the same time, in 20 watts.
[deleted]
IMO this would be considerably easier to read without the “, ELO = ” bits of the annotations.
In general, whenever one can apply a label in just one place (as the y axis label) instead of many (redundant unit descriptor on every annotation), one should. The precise numeric score labels could still be printed (I would prefer with a typographic difference like a smaller italicized font, and tbh I also think they don’t add much value to the chart) without the excess text clutter.
If a novice is 800, how do you get below 500?
Fun fact: 3900 is estimated as a highest possible elo. At this point a computer program should be able to draw against any combination of moves.
Usual caveat about Elo.
Elo Is only valid for relative comparison in a fixed pool of players at that specific time.
That means that all these Elos that are shown here, taken out of context, mean pretty much nothing.
Engine have only being playing between themselves for ages, so there’s no way up there to have a meaningful human number.
But it’s not just that. Even the same single player (say Kasparov) can’t compare his own Elo in the 80s to his own Elo in the 90s because the pools have changed.
So absolute Elo comparison, bad. Relative Elo comparison, from the same exact pool, meaningful.
(Fwiw, deep blue was thought to be just about 2700, but since he didn’t play much, he had no Elo)
![[OC] How do humans compare to the best chess engines?](https://www.europesays.com/wp-content/uploads/2025/02/n0bftkb2hzie1-1920x1024.png)
12 comments
Data source: [downloaded via Our World in Data](https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/computer-chess-ability)
Tools used: basic plotting with ChatGPT, finishing touches in Figma
Intersting to see how high it will really push, does anyone know what a realistic ceiling would be?
Unfortunately Elo doesn’t really work as a system at that insane level and with so few “competitors” (ie other computers) at a similar strength. Yes, computers are much better than humans. Trying to put a number on how much better is pretty futile.
Just to say, 1700 is a pretty decent player – it says “intermediate human” but a 1700 player would still beat anyone who doesn’t play regularly.
The labels of Intermediate Human and Novice Human are a bit weird — a 1700 FIDE player plays a lot of serious chess.
Still pretty good considering the human brain does chess, visual processing, and controlling the rest of a human body at the same time, in 20 watts.
[deleted]
IMO this would be considerably easier to read without the “, ELO = ” bits of the annotations.
In general, whenever one can apply a label in just one place (as the y axis label) instead of many (redundant unit descriptor on every annotation), one should. The precise numeric score labels could still be printed (I would prefer with a typographic difference like a smaller italicized font, and tbh I also think they don’t add much value to the chart) without the excess text clutter.
If a novice is 800, how do you get below 500?
Fun fact: 3900 is estimated as a highest possible elo. At this point a computer program should be able to draw against any combination of moves.
Usual caveat about Elo.
Elo Is only valid for relative comparison in a fixed pool of players at that specific time.
That means that all these Elos that are shown here, taken out of context, mean pretty much nothing.
Engine have only being playing between themselves for ages, so there’s no way up there to have a meaningful human number.
But it’s not just that. Even the same single player (say Kasparov) can’t compare his own Elo in the 80s to his own Elo in the 90s because the pools have changed.
So absolute Elo comparison, bad. Relative Elo comparison, from the same exact pool, meaningful.
(Fwiw, deep blue was thought to be just about 2700, but since he didn’t play much, he had no Elo)
This graph makes Deep Blue look sus
Comments are closed.