Its a point system that estimates your skill level.
Beginners start at some point like 1200(starting point can vary), and then gain points when they win and lose points when they lose. So when people talk about chess the first thing they usually say is their rating.
For more details about the rating system; it’s made to consider your opponents skill level as well. If you are 1200 going versus a 1400, you will gain many points for winning, but lose few points for losing. In chess you can also draw/tie so in this case you would gain points for drawing. Oppositely the higher rated player loses more points for losing to a lower rated players, and gains less points for winning versus a lower rating player. The mathematics makes it so that it should not matter if your opponent is higher or lower rating(up to a certain point…), so there’s no “cheating” by only playing high or low rated oppoents.
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