Terms & privacy

1. The deal

ChessIt is free to use. There are no ads, no in-app purchases, and no paid tier for students. We run it because we want to, which also means it comes as-is, with no warranty: we work hard to keep it accurate and available, but we cannot promise it will always be either, and we are not liable for losses arising from its use. It is a training tool, not a certification — your rating here is our best FIDE-style estimate, not an official title.

2. Your account

Sign in with Google or an email address. Keep your password to yourself, and use one account per person — the coaching adapts to you, so sharing an account ruins the tuition for both of you.

Children: ChessIt is built to be safe for young players. If you are under 13, a parent or guardian should create the account with you and stays responsible for it. We deliberately never ask for a date of birth — only a coarse “young learner” setting that changes how the app speaks.

3. What we collect — and what we never do

We store the minimum the coaching needs:

• your email and display name (from sign-in), and any username you claim;
• your chess activity: games played here, puzzles attempted, lessons finished, ratings, streaks and XP — this is the coaching data;
• games and ratings you choose to import from Lichess or Chess.com, fetched from their public APIs only when you ask;
• messages you send through the contact form, and anonymous crash reports if the app breaks (so we can fix it).

Just as important is what we never do:

• No advertising, ever. Nothing here is sponsored.
• No selling or sharing your data with anyone, for anything.
• No third-party trackers or analytics. Crash reporting is our own and stays inside our database.
• No date of birth, no phone number, no location. We do not want data we do not need.
• A photo taken for the Real Board feature is read for the position and never stored.

4. Where your data lives, and who can see it

Everything is stored in Google Firebase (the same infrastructure most apps you use run on), protected by security rules under which each student can read only their own data. The app’s administrator — one named person, not a team — can view training data to run and improve the coaching. The Rivals leaderboard shows only your chosen username, phase and training numbers to other signed-in players, and only if you claim a username; skip that, and you appear to nobody. If you accept a coach or parent in Coach Mode, that one person can additionally view your profile and training data, read-only, until you remove them in Settings — nothing is shared before you accept, and nothing after you remove them. Automated daily backups exist so a technical failure cannot erase your progress.

5. Fair play

ChessIt’s engine analysis, board camera and coaching are for your own games, your own analysis, and your own learning. Using them to get help during a rated game against another person — over the board or on another site — is cheating, it is against those sites’ rules as well as ours, and it defeats the entire point of training. Don’t.

6. Leaving, and taking your leave seriously

You can delete your account yourself, any time, in Settings → Delete account — no email to write, no retention tricks, no “are you sure” guilt trips. It permanently removes your sign-in, profile, games and progress, and frees your username. We may close accounts that abuse the service (cheating on the leaderboard, hostile behaviour, attacking the infrastructure) — with a child’s account, we would talk to a parent first.

7. Credit where it belongs

ChessIt stands on generous shoulders: the Stockfish engine (GPL v3 — its source is at github.com/official-stockfish) does all the chess judging; the practice library draws on the Lichess puzzle database (released CC0 by Lichess and its players); and the master games are public-domain classics. Thank you to all of them.

8. Changes and questions

If these terms change in any way that matters, the date at the top changes and significant changes will be flagged in the app. Questions, corrections, or a privacy request we have not thought of? Contact us — a person reads every message.