Disclaimer: This is not an article that is written by someone who will sell you anything. 99 % of the “chess online coaching” articles are written by companies that will push you to purchase their services.
This isn’t.
This article is written by someone who has experience in choosing a chess teacher online & offline – and that is willing to share this information with you (for free). Hope you enjoy the article – and appreciate the honesty. 🙂
Prior to writing this article, I have, over the span of a year, hired three different chess teachers. They all have a quite different “profile”. You can read more about the different coaches in the list below.
In my opinion, trying different teachers makes me more suited to write an article like this.
I know what you should look for in a chess teacher – and, more importantly, what you should avoid.
These are the “profiles” of the people I’ve hired:
- One Filipino guy that taught me chess online (15 USD/hour & ELO = 2000)
- One guy from my city in Norway that met me in a chess bar and taught me chess (50 USD/hour & ELO = 2100/2200)
- I also hired a grandmaster through a “premium platform” that taught me chess online for one class only (150 USD/hour & ELO = over 2600)
So what did I like the best? What type of chess teacher should you look for? And was it really worth spending 150 USD for one hour with a grandmaster!?
And most importantly: where can I source good chess teachers online or locally in my area?
All these questions will be answered in this article. 😉
Table of Contents
- Online or offline?
- Best platforms to find your chess coach
- Three different segments of chess coaches
- Relevant links from other forums
- Books and chess board recommendations
- Quicky summary
- FAQ
Online or offline?
First things first.
The very first question you need to ask yourself is: do you want a teacher that teaches you chess online? Or do you prefer to meet someone in a bar, in a cafè, in a library or somewhere else?
I have tried both. And to be honest, I prefer to be taught chess online.
Let me explain you why.
Advantages of online chess tutoring
Learning chess online is not only an advantage for you as a student. It also helps the teacher to prepare more in-depth and more specific lessons.
Platforms like Chess.com and Lichess.org can help you to set up different puzzles in seconds. If you did it physically over the board, each situation would take 20-30 seconds to set up.
Example:
Below are just some of the advantages that I can come up with right away when you learn chess online:
- You can hire cheap teachers from third world countries
- The flexibility of moving the pieces online is 100 % more time-efficient
- You can easily work on chess puzzles that are generated in seconds on Chess.com & Lichess.org
- You don’t have to travel anywhere
To be honest, I love online tutoring in chess. I hate online tutoring in almost all disciplines and topics, but with chess…it’s so good. 🙂
However, there are a couple of disadvantages I would mention:
- If you (or your coach) have an unstable connection, there might be communication problems
- Meeting someone in person will always create a nice connection
Best platforms to find your chess coach
My first teacher was recommended to my by a friend.
The second one was found on a platform that I saw some advertising for on TV.
The third one came to me after I posted a job listing on Upwork.
In other words, I don’t have much experience with these “hire a chess coach” websites. But I will try to give an overview of what’s out there.
Top 3 platforms for finding a coach
Upwork
- Freelancer platform
- Hourly rate: 15-100 USD
Private Chess
- Professional teachers
- Hourly rate: Unknown..?
Chess.com
- Big variety of skilled and unskilled teachers
- Hourly rate: 5-100 USD
These are great places to start.
If you have other websites that you know work well, please let me know in the comment section below the article.
Read our recommendations of of the best chess blogs and influencers.
Three different segments of chess coaches
After spending hours of looking up various chess teachers, I believe it’s possible to divide them into three different categories:
- Premium teachers
- Mid-range teachers
- Cheap chess teachers
Let me give you a realistic picture of what you can expect from each category in terms of price, quality and progress.
Premium Chess Teachers
- High-ranked IMs or Grandmasters
- Charge between 100-250 USD per hour
- Suits students that have already passed the 2000 ELO rank
Mid-Range Chess Teachers
- International Master or above
- Spends a lot of time teaching chess – both online & offline
- ELO: ~2000-2200
Cheap Chess Teachers
- Typically work online from low-cost countries like South East Asia
- Teaches online
- ELO: ~1800-2100
- Price: Between 5-15 USD/hour
What chess teacher did I find most useful?
Well, I’m not gonna lie. It was an honor to have a grandmaster trying to teach me the different variations of the queen’s gambit. But it was nothing more than that.
Moreover, it wasn’t really fun spending 150 $ on 60-65 minutes with the guy.
My best overall experience was with my teacher from the Philippines. He has long experience in teaching beginners like myself. In addition to that, he was always patient and brilliant at explaining different aspects of the game.
Also, it helped that he was so affordable that I could always book him for two hours straight.
In conclusion, I would say that you do not need to hire a chess teacher that has any title (International Master [IM] or Grand Master [GM]) if you are below ELO = 2000. Once you become better than your coach, you can consider hiring someone like Magnus Carlsen to take you to the next level…. 😉
PS! I promised not to flog you anything in this article. And I’m not gonna do that. But a lot of people have asked for the contact details of my chess teacher in the Philippines. If you are interested: leave a comment below and I will mail you his contact info.
15 USD/hour is a bargain for a professional chess coach. 🙂
It’s especially cheap for someone like this guy! He is polite, great at teaching…and I’ve learned so much from him.
Relevant links from other forums
Believe it or not: I am not the only person that can give great advice on choosing a chess teacher.
Books and chess board recommendations
The reason why I wrote this article was because I saw the amazing numbers of my previous chess articles.
I have written and published two of them on Sustainability Matters in the past:
Frankly, I would especially recommend the one about chess books. I have personally seem quite extreme growth in my ELO rating over the last year. And I can thank these books for that:
Quicky summary
Finding someone that will teach you chess isn’t hard. You will always find someone.
But to find someone good and affordable is much more difficult. I have done my best in this article to explain the steps I took to to find my dream coach.
And I believe that you can do it as well.
FAQ
I have paid everything between 10$ – 150 $. It all depends what you are looking for.
Honestly, I do not see the point in paying more than 10-15 $ for a good chess coach if you find him or her online.
Absolutely. I would recommend that you look up your local chess club. There are many high-rated chess players that are willing to take a part-time job as a teacher.
Your teacher will tell you that.
During your first lesson, it’s quite normal that you play several games against each other. While playing these games, your teacher will analyze which mistakes you do – and therefore what you guys should focus on.
My Filipino teacher was brilliant at that. He was very early in highlighting a couple of things in my games that I did wrong. And once I had spend some time on improving those, my ELO sky-rocketed. 🙂
Great article ! I would like to link up with your coach from Philippine. I was looking for someone affordable who can teach my 7 year old. Thanks !
Hi Sydney, that sounds great. I am sure he is good with kids as well. From the way I know him, he is both super patient and polite. 🙂
Hi, thank you gor sharing valuable info as i was looking for proper advise, not driven by commerce.
I started playing a few months ago, as i had acc on lichess i did started to play there and my score in 10min games is ~850 after some 100games.
I did register on chess.com and played like 10 games and my score was dropping in hundreds after resign and after loss at around -50, now is 100.
I was considering in finding a good teacher to improve my skill. Would be grateful if you could share contact to your mentioned teacher from Philippines
Hi Pavel, nice to see your comment. And good that you have recently discovered the beauty of chess! 🙂
Sure – I’ll send you his contact details on email.
Hi Amund, thank you for all the information. I’d also like your coach’s contact info. Thank you!
Hi Tobias, sure, I’ll send it to you by e-mail! 🙂
Nicely written and well summarized. Please share the details of the teacher too.
Thanks 🙂 Will send you an e-mail
Hi can you send me the details of your coach?
That was a very helpful article
Thanks
Hello Shriram, sure, I’ll send you the details. 🙂
Hi Amund – thanks for a great article.
Yes I’d like the teacher’s details too, please.
John
Hi John, that’s OK. 🙂 I will set up a mail conversation with the three of us.
Thanks for kind words.
Hey! I’m far below 2000 so definitely interested in your filipino chess teacher! Great article!
Hey Michael, sounds good. I’ll have him send you an e-mail.
I’d like to hire your chess coach!
Hehe, alright, Jake! I will have him send you an e-mail! 🙂
Hello, I am interested in your coach’s contact
Thank you !
Hello, that’s OK – I will have him contact you by e-mail! 🙂 Good luck!
Hi! I’m interested in the contact of your coach!
Hi, very useful article! Thanks for sharing your experiences. My 5.5 year old son is obsessed with chess and does have good chess acumen. We want some guidance on what could be the best possible coaching he can have to learn and build chess skills. He is learning for last 3 months from an Asian teacher.
Can you please suggest some coaching for him?
Hi Sathya. Hope all is good.
I had a very great experience with my chess coach just before I wrote the article. The reason is that he was able to quickly understand what I did wrong in my games. It didn’t take a lot of time to cleraly focus on the 2-3 things that I had big problems with…and I went from 1000 ELO up to 1300 ELO. Do you want me to send the contact details to the coach or are you just looking for tips on how a teacher should work with your son?
I really hope your son succeeds building his chess skills! 🙂
Hey could you send me your coaches contact info? Thanks!
Hey David. Sure, I will! 🙂
An you please send your teacher email . I need to plan for my 7year old daughter
Hi Sivakumar! 🙂 Sure – I’ll do that.
Hi, Amund. Thank you for your article – just what I was looking for. Would you please give me the name of your Philipino coach? Thank you. Robert
Hi Robert. Happy you liked the article.
I will of course forward you an e-mail with his contact info and where he is CC’ed.
Kind regards,
Hello Amund,
I was looking up chess tutors when I came across your article. Would be grateful if you could share the contact details for your Philippino coach.
Thanks,
Omair
Hi Omair. Sure, that’s no problem. I am sending you an email. 🙂
Hello Amund,
Thank you for sharing your experience. I’m trying to find a chess coach for my boy. Would you please share your Philippine coach infor? I would like to have a try for my sun. Thank you very much.
Hi Yuanyuan. Sure – I’m sending you an email! 🙂
Hi Amund,
Thanks for the informative article. just wonder if you could email me the details of your chess teacher in Philippine?
Thanks so very much,
Anna (Canada)
Hi Anna! Yes, sure 🙂
Hi,
Thanks for writing the article, would it be okay if could email me the details of your chess teacher?
Thanks in advance,
Charlie (UK)
Hi Charlie. Certainly!
Kind regards,
Amund
Hi. This is a helpful article. Could you pass on your teacher’s contact info to me?
Hi Nathan! Sure 🙂
Thanks Amund. Out of curiosity, what was your ELO before working with your coach and what did it increase to?
Hi, it went from about 900 to 1200 if I remember correctly. An as I don’t have time to play too much chess these days, I am stuck at 1200.
Hey, nice article. Pls send me that chess teacher contact. Thank you Amund.
Hey. Thank you, Diego.
Sending you an e-mail.
Pls send me the contact of your chess teacher. Thanks so much.
Hi Sam. Sure enough! 🙂