Group member Mark Paulson says: there are a couple of excellent, accessible chess websites which I’d say are guaranteed to improve anyone’s game! They are chess.com and lichess.org.
They are both generally free to access, with additional premium services available for a price. They offer
- lessons for every level and for every stage of a game, eg the opening, the endgame, finding checkmate;
- puzzles, which are a great way to learn pattern recognition;
- the chance to play online opponents at every level (Chess.com calls these levels new to chess; beginner, intermediate and advanced)
- or to play the online avatars, which you can similarly choose to play at any level, but with no time limit because they make their moves instantly.
I’m most familiar with chess.com. On its home page, the left-hand icons include a mortar board for lessons and the jigsaw piece for puzzles. On both sites you can simply play as a guest. Games are timed, and having chosen your level you can set the timer to a number of different options, eg 3, 5, 10 or 30 minutes (that’s per player, so 30 minutes is a potential one hour game) and the site will find you a random opponent at your chosen level.
These sites will automatically identify checkmate and prevent illegal moves, such as castling out of check. They will declare a draw if you trigger one of the rules, eg stalemate, threefold-repetition or when neither side has sufficient material to win. You can also offer/accept the offer of an agreed draw.
As an alternative to playing as a guest, you can sign up to chess.com, which is free, and then your games are rated, and you get matched to players of a similar rating: incidentally, you then get to see which country your opponent is in. Signing up is necessary for access to chess.com lessons and the full range of puzzles other than the popular daily puzzle which gets harder as the week goes on.
Chess.com’s premium service is essentially access to reviews of a game after it has been played, where your and your opponents’ mistakes and blunders are laid bare, together with alternative move suggestions.
