Chess - Play and Learn

Chess.com Review: Free Games, Paid Puzzles and Lessons

Play First, Against People or Bots

A match is set up in two taps: pick a time control — the store screens show clocks at 1:38 and 5:00 — and either take a rated opponent or a bot from a graded list running new to chess, beginner, intermediate and advanced. Ratings sit beside every name, so you always know what you are facing. Games against people can be played live or by correspondence over days, which is the format that survives a phone being put away mid-game. Unlimited games cost nothing, which is the foundation everything else rests on.

Puzzles and the Game Review Do the Teaching

Puzzles are single positions with one correct idea, rated like a player — 5,953 in the store example, gaining 49 points for a solve, on a nineteen-second clock. Lessons are laid out as a map of themed nodes such as key openings, with a next-lesson button that keeps a beginner moving without choosing. Game Review then annotates a finished game move by move, marking brilliancies and blunders against an evaluation graph that shows exactly where a position collapsed. That combination is why the app teaches better than any single opponent could.

Memberships From $4.99 to $16.99 a Month

The free account gives unlimited games, a few puzzles a day and limited lessons and reviews, with advertising around them. The App Store lists Gold at $4.99 and $6.99 monthly, Platinum at $6.99 and $10.99, and Diamond at $14.99 and $16.99, with annual plans at $29.99, $49.99, $99.99 and $119.99 — pricing that varies by promotion rather than by feature list. Apple rates the app 4+ with advertising and chat, on a 449.8 MB install; Play shows 4.7 from 3.35 million reviews against 4.8 from 818,000 on Apple.