Above the board, pick a color and a game gets created instantly. You'll get a short link — send it however you'd normally talk to this person: text, WhatsApp, Discord, email. The moment they open it, they're sitting across the board from you. No invite code to read out over the phone, no login screen standing between you and the first move.
That makes it easy on friends and family: a grandparent or a kid who just needs to tap a link is on the board in seconds, without logging in to anything.
This is 2 player chess online in the most literal sense: one board, one link, two people. Online multiplayer chess, but the multiplayer is just the two of you, 1v1. Not a lobby full of strangers.
When you create a game, the site generates a private game page at its own web address and hands you the link to it. Anyone who opens that link lands on the same live board you're looking at. The first person in claims a seat — creator or friend, whoever gets there first plays the color they picked, and the second person plays whatever's left.
Moves sync in real time. There's no refresh button to hit and no "waiting for opponent to move" spinner that lies to you — you'll see their piece glide across the board within a moment of them making the move, wherever they are.
If your friend's connection drops, the game just waits. Reopen the same link later and you're back in your seat, same position, same color, nothing lost. After a couple of minutes with no sign of them, you'll get the option to claim the win, in case they've genuinely wandered off rather than just lost signal.
There's no rating attached to your games here, no matchmaking queue, no ranked ladder to climb. You already have an opponent — the friend you sent the link to — so none of that machinery exists. What's left is just the board, a move list, and a resign or draw-offer button if the game needs to end early.
It also means the whole thing loads fast. No ad script to wait on, no account system to authenticate against. Create a game, copy the link, and you can be waiting on your friend's first move in under three seconds — which matters more than it sounds like when the game in question is "one more before we have to leave for dinner."
Pawns move forward and capture diagonally, knights hop in an L over anything in the way, bishops stay on diagonals, rooks on straight lines, the queen covers both, and the king takes one square at a time. Tap through all six on how the chess pieces move, or read the rules of chess end to end.
Every move is checked against the real rules before it's allowed, including castling, en passant, and pawn promotion, so an illegal move simply won't go through for either player.
No. Neither of you signs up for anything. Your seat in the game is remembered in your browser, so closing the tab and coming back later still puts you back in the same game.
Yes. Create a game above the board, pick a color, and you get a link to share with your friend. They open it and you're both on the same live board, with no sign up for either of you.
No, this is a website. It runs in any modern browser on a phone, tablet or computer, so there's nothing to download and nothing to install.
Doesn't matter. It's a website, not an app, so it works the same in any modern browser on any device — iPhone, Android, laptop, whatever either of you has open.
Only people who have the exact link can find the game — it isn't listed anywhere or searchable. Treat the link like you would any private invite: whoever you send it to can join.
Yes, no ads and no paid tier. Playing online costs nothing for either of you.
That's what local pass-and-play is for — one device, no link needed, and it works offline too.