Chess.com — BrandWiki

Chess.com

Overview

Chess.com, LLC

commercial
screenshot	Chess.com Homepage (as of December 2017).PNG
company type	Internet chess server
language count	57
language	Afrikaans, Albanian, Arabic, Armenian, Azerbaijani, Bengali, Belarusian, Bosnian, Bulgarian, Catalan, Chinese, Chinese (Hong Kong), Chinese (Taiwan), Croatian, Czech, Danish, Dutch, English, Estonian, Filipino, Finnish, Flemish, French, Galician, Georgian, German, Greek, Hebrew, Hindi, Hungarian, Icelandic, Indonesian, Italian, Japanese, Korean, Latvian, Lithuanian, Malay, Norwegian, Persian, Polish, Portuguese, Portuguese (Brazil), Romanian, Russian, Serbian, Slovak, Slovenian, Spanish, Swahili, Swedish, Tagalog, Turkish, Turkmen, Ukrainian, Uzbek, Vietnamese
advertising	Displayed to anonymous users and free account-holders only; paying account-holders are not shown ads

foundation	May 2007

location country	United States

founder	Erik Allebest Jay Severson

ceo	Erik Allebest

key people	Jay Severson (Chief Technical Advisor) Daniel Rensch (Chief Chess Officer) Brenan Klain (Chief Marketing Officer)

industry	Online game

subsidiaries	ChessKid.com Play Magnus Group

num employees	650+‡R1R‡

registration	Optional

num users	200 million+‡R2R‡

current status	Active

programming language	Java‡R3R‡ · JavaScript · PHP

type	Internet chess server

Chess.com is an internet chess server. The largest chess platform in the world,[4] the site operates on a freemium model in which some features are available for free, and others are available via subscription. Users can play live online chess against other users in daily, rapid, blitz, or bullet time controls, with a number of chess variants available. Additionally, the platform offers play against chess engines, computer analysis, chess puzzles, and teaching resources.

Chess.com reached 200 million users in early 2025,[5] and had about 11 million daily active users as of April 2023.[6] Chess.com has hosted online tournaments, including Titled Tuesdays, the PRO Chess League, the Speed Chess Championships, PogChamps, Online Chess Olympiads, and computer vs computer events.

History

Founding

The domain Chess.com was set up in 1995 by Aficionado, a company based in Berkeley, California, to sell Chess Mentor, a chess-tutoring app.[7] In 2005, Internet entrepreneur Erik Allebest and partner Jarom "Jay" Severson, who met as undergraduate students at Brigham Young University, bought the domain name, and Aficionado moved to chessmentor.com. Erik and Jay assembled a team of software developers to redevelop the site as a chess portal.[8] The site was relaunched in 2007 with heavy campaigning and promotion on social media.[9]

Two years later, Chess.com acquired a similar chess social networking site, chesspark.com.[10] In October 2013, it acquired the Amsterdam-based chessvibes.com,[11]

Subsidiary companies

ChessKid.com

Chess.com runs the subsidiary site ChessKid.com for chess players that are under the minimum age requirement for Chess.com.[39]

ChessKid.com has run a yearly online championship called CONIC (the ChessKid Online National Invitational Championship), since 2012 which is recognized by the United States Chess Federation.[40][41] According to David Petty, the event organizer in 2013, ChessKid has made agreements and partnerships with chess associations in schools. They have a long-term partnership with the NTCA (North Texas Chess Academy) which gives children access to online instructors.[42]

Play Magnus Group

Tournaments and events

Speed Chess Championship

Chess.com has held the Speed Chess Championship annually since 2016, involving a single-elimination tournament featuring some of the world's best players. Magnus Carlsen and Hikaru Nakamura have both won five championships.[46]

Tournament formula

The most important elements of the tournament formula:[47]

16-player single-elimination bracket
Matches consist of three segments: 90 minutes of 5+1, 60 minutes of 3+1, and 30 minutes of 1+1.
The player with the most cumulative points at the end of the match wins.

External links

References

About Chess.com Chess.com, retrieved February 6, 2025^
Chess.com. Members - Chess.com^
Chess.com chooses Azul Zing to enhance real-time gaming experience Marketwired, April 26, 2016, retrieved September 4, 2018^

Titled Tuesday

Titled Tuesday is an 11-round Swiss-system blitz chess tournament held every Tuesday, where all entrants must have a FIDE or national master title and their full legal name registered on their Chess.com account.[73] The event started as a monthly 9 round tournament. The first edition was held on October 28, 2014 with a total prize fund of $1,000, including $500 for first place, which was won by Baadur Jobava.[74] It became a weekly event on April 7, 2020, permanently became 11 rounds on October 20, 2020, and on February 1, 2022, the prize fund increased from $1600 to $2500, with $1000 for first place. Two events were also to be held every week instead of one.[75]

In June 2018, Chess.com held a special version of the tournament for which the winner would go on to participate in the Isle of Man International which had a prize fund of £144,000.[76] Iranian GM Pouria Darini won the event.[77]

By August 28, 2024, GM Hikaru Nakamura had the most tournament wins since October 2020 with 77, followed by GM Magnus Carlsen with 20, and GM Dmitry Andreikin with 17. Other super grandmaster winners include Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, Alexander Grischuk, Alireza Firouzja, Wesley So, Ian Nepomniachtchi, and Fabiano Caruana.[73]

Until September 2025, games played were of the 3+1 format, meaning 3 minutes per player, with a 1-second increment—to be added each turn.[73] Since 2 September 2025, the time control format was changed to 5+0, and the prize fund increased to a total of $3,000—with 1st, 2nd and 3rd place receiving $1,000, $750 and $350 respectively. In addition to the stand-alone "Top Woman" prize, the "Top 3 Streamers" category was added, with $100 each in additional weekly prizes.[78] Among other changes made in September 2025 was the roll-out of Proctor, Chess.com's "fair play" anti-cheat software. Proctor would become a requirement for all players competing in prized events.[79] Titled Tuesday was also announced to become a qualifying pathway to the 2026 Esports World Cup, and to be partnering with chess media start-up Take Take Take.[80][81]

In 2025, the After Party and Untitled After Party were both added to the weekly roster of Tuesday events, with untitled players now also able to compete for a cash prize. Scheduled two hours after Titled Tuesday, these would be arena-style tournaments, last for two hours and feature a 3+0 game format. Their introduction aimed to provide new opportunities for untitled players and to encourage more broadcasting of Chess.com events through live-streaming platforms.[82] An additional $1,500 was made available for 7 titled players and streamers, $500 for the top 3 untitled players (streaming being a pre-requisite) and $100 for the "Top Woman". This increase in funding brought the weekly prize total for all Tuesday events to $5,000.[82]

Chess.com

History

Founding

Subsidiary companies

ChessKid.com

Play Magnus Group

Tournaments and events

Speed Chess Championship

Tournament formula

See also

External links

References

Growth in the 2010s

Response to the Russian invasion of Ukraine

Chess cheating controversy

Chess.com Global Championship

Torch

Winners of Speed Chess Championships

Tournament formula

Winners of Speed Chess Championships

Daily Chess Championships

Tournament formula

Winners of Daily Chess Championships

Tournament formula

Winners of Daily Chess Championships

PRO Chess League

Winners of PRO Chess League

Winners of PRO Chess League

Titled Tuesday

Death Matches

Chess.com Computer Chess Championship

PogChamps

Coaches