Playing chess on the board

Hi I've been thinking I should consider chess more seriously to improve but also to see what I can achieve if I commit myself into something, I've been in some kind of a small club(around 10 years ago) before but never played in tournaments or any competitive games as it was mostly learning basic stuff (which really helped!) , AFAIK I haven't played 2 hours games. I kinda miss playing with a real opponent, even though I enjoy lichess.
Do you have any ideas or advices you would like to share? I think it's time for me to study openings I am pretty bad at it, I always played e4 and I am clueless with d4 or other stuff lol.
Thanks for reading!

you should definitely study openings but you should start studying the endgame first.

I prefer playing on lichess because if you play on other websites such as chess.com. It completely throws me off, it’s because most lower rated players there don't know opening theory. I get confused all the time. I am supposed to win but alas. They always play weird moves that I can't understand at all. It always turns out to be a weird opening trick so I lose material in the opening.very frustrating. Lichess. It's a great website and the standards here are much higher than chess.com in my opinion. Players here know theory and they can play very well.

If you love chess and want to pursue it as a career, definitely study. It you love it as a hobby, definitely study as well. It's a great past time activity. It sharpens your thinking skills.

8 months ago, I started getting myself into chess. It is extremely fun. I joined in a tournament and after that I got hooked on the game. I started searching for websites to play on and the first thing I see... chess.com.

I joined and registered an account and I played on the website. It was quite thrilling and exciting. Then, I started buying a ton of books and I started reading them. I spend about 2 hours everyday playing chess and half an hour doing chess studies on a real board. When i started on chess.com, the initial rating was 800. But I was pretty bad and I got it to 689 ( it was realllllly low like what)
After a learned theory and spent some off time off the website and I came back,I improved drastically. Going from 689 to 1200 almost in two days. But then there's a problem. The website throws me off. A lot of players don't know theory and they always play a LOT of tricks in the opening which I completely don't understand.

And then, I found lichess. I was happy to find this website as the standard for players are higher and most people knew theory.
I immediately got stuck on about 900. It was really hard. I rested for a while. During this, I played chess a lot with people of a chess club I joined. I did chess studies a lot and needless to say. I improved a lot. Now, my rating is 1700 for all of the time formats.

Oh and btw I checked some of your games. I don't really recommend bullet chess. It's a bad time format. You should deifinitely play longer time formats. It makes you think. Bullet chess don't need a lot of calculation as you only have a minute. But bullet chess if definitely very fun to play with.

In my opinion its better to know one opening really well (in your case 1. e4) rather than spreading yourself. There are even top GMs (eg Adams) who open 1.e4 almost exclusively.

Play good moves!

I think you should learn popular openings in both e4 and d4. This will help you to play better as black as you would know what are the best moves for white . For example in d4 it could be the queens Gambit or on e4 , it could be Sicilian or e4 -e5 games .in conclusion you should learn a lot opening theory to become a versatile player to avoid being taken into a deep dark forest where you don't know what 1+1 is or the best moves in the position. Endgames you should know pawn structures, the use of minor pieces and rook activity as this what usually occurs in endgames

By the way you are a very strong player to be clueless in other openings

Yeah I was thinking I should play more opening partially to know how to respond as black, well I try not to do anything risky in openings or I would run into traps, anyone have any experienced in tournament, I was also wondering if you had to get a fide rating to participate in one, I am leaving in France so if anyone ever participated in one there let me know!

You certainly don't need a FIDE rating to participate in tournaments - you get a FIDE rating by participating in FIDE-rated tournaments (or playing FIDE-rated matches).

I have no knowledge of the French system, but normally there is both a national rating system (eg USCF, ECF, DZW....) and also the international (FIDE) one. Generally local tournaments are not FIDE rated and are only rated on the national system, whereas bigger/more important ones are rated both nationally and also by FIDE.

You might need to be a member of the national chess federation to play rated games (details depend on country).

@aravinth You don't need to worry about playing tournaments but I STRONGLY recommend that you play for a while over the board before you participate in tournaments because playing on the internet too much makes you blind in over the board games!!! (you miss tactics and moves you would see instantly in online chess)