FYI, there has been even further progress with Leela odds nets. Here are some recent quotes from GM Larry Kaufman (a.k.a. Hissha) found on the Leela Chess Zero Discord:
(2025-03-04) I completed an analysis of how the Leela odds nets have performed on LiChess since the search-contempt upgrade on Feb. 27. [...] I believe these are reasonable estimates of the LiChess Blitz rating needed to break even with the bots at 5′3“ in serious play. Queen and move odds (means Leela plays Black) 2400, Queen odds (Leela White) 2550, [...] Rook and move odds (Leela Black); 3000. Rook odds (Leela White) 3050, knight odds 3200. For comparison only a few top humans exceed 3000, with Magnus at 3131. So based on this, even Magnus would lose a match at 5′3” with knight odds, while perhaps the top five blitz players in the world would win a match at rook odds. Maybe about top fifty could win a match at queen for knight. At queen odds (Leela White), a “par” (FIDE 2400) IM should come out ahead, while a “par” (FIDE 2300) FM should come out behind.
(2025-03-07) Yes, there have to be limits to what is possible, but we keep blowing by what we thought those limits were! A decade ago, blitz games (3′2″) were pretty even between the best engine (then Komodo) and “par” GMs at knight odds. Maybe some people imagined that some day we could push that to being even at rook odds, but if anyone had suggested queen odds that would have been taken as a joke. And yet, if we’re not there already, we are closing in on it. Similarly at Classical time controls, we could barely give knight odds to players with ratings like FIDE 2100 back then, giving knight odds to “par” GMs in Classical seemed like an impossible goal. Now I think we are already there, and giving rook odds to players in Classical at least seems a realistic goal. What it means is that chess is more complicated than we thought it was.
FYI, there has been even further progress with Leela odds nets. Here are some recent quotes from GM Larry Kaufman (a.k.a. Hissha) found on the Leela Chess Zero Discord: