How the CollectorX rating and the 10-tier ladder work
Every player starts at 1200. Your rating moves after each rated round, using the Glicko-2 system, and your marks against your opponent's decide which way. After 10 placement rounds you get one of ten tiers, from Aspirant to Cabinet Secretary, each 150 points wide.
Keshav Melnad
Product updates5 min read
When you finish a rated duel on CollectorX, a number next to your name moves. This post explains what that number is, why it moves by the amount it does, and how it decides your place on the ladder.
I have tried to keep it free of maths. The one idea worth carrying away is that the rating is an estimate, and the system knows how sure it is.
The short version
Every player starts at a rating of 1200.
After each rated round, your rating goes up if you scored more marks than your opponent and down if you scored fewer. A level round counts as a draw.
How much it moves depends on two things: how strong your opponent's rating is, and how sure the system is about both of you.
Your first 10 rated rounds are placement rounds. Your rating moves, but no tier is shown; the app says "Calibrating".
After placement, your rating puts you in one of ten tiers, from Aspirant to Cabinet Secretary.
The difference that matters is this. Elo gives every player one number. Glicko-2 gives every player a number and a measure of how uncertain that number is, called the rating deviation. Glickman's own description puts it simply: when the deviation is low, the system is confident about a player's strength; when it is high, it is not.
This matters a lot for a UPSC duel. A rated round has only 3 to 6 questions (8 in Blitz). One unlucky set of questions, say three environment questions when you are strong in polity, can lose you a round you would usually win. A system that trusts every round equally would swing your rating up and down on luck. Glicko-2 moves a new or uncertain rating quickly, and an established rating slowly. Your rating settles as it gathers evidence.
What moves your rating, and what doesn't
Only marks decide a round. The scoring is UPSC's own: +2 for a right answer, −0.67 for a wrong one, 0 for a skip. Whoever has more marks at the end of the round wins it. If both have the same marks, it is a draw. Outside Blitz, speed earns nothing: answering faster does not break a tie or add to your score. I explained this choice in .
Keshav Melnad
Prepared for the UPSC Civil Services Examination for six years before building CollectorX on his own. He holds a PhD from IIT Bombay, and his research on Sanskrit astronomical texts is published in peer-reviewed journals.
Who you beat matters. Beating a player rated well above you moves your rating more than beating one rated below you. Losing to a stronger player costs you less than losing to a weaker one. This is what keeps the ladder fair: you cannot climb by playing only weak opponents.
Some matches are never rated. Practice against a bot, Echo matches (a replay of another player's past answers) and friend challenges do not change your rating. In none of them is your opponent playing live against you with a rating at stake, so a win there is not the same evidence.
Blitz has its own rating. A Blitz round has 8 questions with 10 seconds each, and it is the one place where speed counts: if a Blitz round is level on marks, the faster player wins it. Because that tests something different, Blitz keeps a separate rating, with its own 10 placement rounds, and does not touch your main one.
Placement: the first 10 rounds
A new player's rating is the least certain number in the system. If I showed you a tier after one round, an unlucky first round could label you Aspirant on your first day. So for your first 10 rated rounds the app shows "Calibrating" instead of a tier.
Your rating still moves during placement, and it moves quickly, because the system is still unsure about you. When I tested the settings on simulated players, the rating usually settled within about 4 rounds. Ten rounds leaves a good margin.
The ten tiers
After placement, your rating decides your tier. The names follow the career of an IAS officer, from the exam to the top of the service:
Aspirant: below 1200
Probationer: 1200 to 1349
Assistant Collector: 1350 to 1499
Sub-Divisional Magistrate: 1500 to 1649
Additional Collector: 1650 to 1799
District Collector: 1800 to 1949
Divisional Commissioner: 1950 to 2099
Secretary: 2100 to 2249
Chief Secretary: 2250 to 2399
Cabinet Secretary: 2400 and above
The ten tiers by rating. Every player starts at 1200, the bottom of Probationer.
Each tier is split into three steps, III, II and I, with I at the top. So you might be "District Collector II".
Two things about the bands are deliberate.
You start at tier 2, not tier 1. The starting rating of 1200 is the bottom of Probationer. Aspirant is the tier below the start, so it holds players whose rating has fallen, not every newcomer.
District Collector is a real climb. It begins 600 points above the start. The product is named after that post, and I wanted reaching it to mean something.
Your tier is always worked out from your current rating; it is never stored on its own. If a rating is ever corrected, the tier follows it at once.
If you stop playing for a while
If you don't play for some time, your rating does not drop. But the system becomes less sure of it, because you may have improved or forgotten things in the meantime. Twice a day a job widens the uncertainty of inactive players. When you come back, your next few rounds move your rating more than usual, until it settles again. Blitz ratings are not widened this way.
This is how Glicko-2 is meant to treat a player who has been away: not as weaker, only as less known.
What the rating is for
A rating is not a prediction of your Prelims score. It compares you with the other players on CollectorX, in short rounds of PYQs, and nothing more.
What it is good for is a fair opponent. Matchmaking first looks for someone close to your rating, and widens the search only the longer you wait. So most rounds are close, and a win tells you something. Over many rounds, the rating shows whether your preparation is moving in the right direction. If you want to see your place, the leaderboard on CollectorX lists players by rating.
Sources
Example of the Glicko-2 system, Mark E. Glickman — Glicko-2 gives each player a rating, a rating deviation and a volatility; a low RD means the system is confident about a player's strength. (accessed 7 November 2026)
Lichess FAQ — Lichess calculates ratings with the Glicko-2 method developed by Mark Glickman. (accessed 7 November 2026)
CollectorX game rules and source (packages/game-core, apps/api), checked 2026-11-07 — CollectorX: starting rating 1200; rating updated per round with Glicko-2; a level round is a draw; 10 placement rounds shown as Calibrating; ten tiers 150 points wide with three steps; tier derived from rating; inactive players' RD widened twice daily; Blitz is 8 questions of 10 seconds with its own pool, decided on speed when level; bot, Echo and friend challenges unrated; matchmaking band widens with wait. (accessed 7 November 2026)
