Account & privacy

Open Settings and click Change email. Enter the new address and your password to confirm. ChessHere sends a verification email to the new address; clicking the link finalizes the switch. Until you verify, the old address stays active. If you lose access to both addresses, contact support — recovery is possible but slow because identity verification has to be manual.

Yes, but only once. Open Settings → Account and pick Change username. Your old username stops working immediately and your profile URL updates. Existing links pointing to your old profile redirect for thirty days, then return 404. Friends, ratings, games, and messages all stay attached to your account. The single-change limit prevents identity-laundering and griefing.

Open the player's profile and click Block. Blocked players cannot challenge you, message you, or comment on your activity. They are not notified of the block. You can unblock from Settings → Blocked users. Blocking is one-way and account-level; making a new account to evade a block is a violation that leads to suspension. Blocks survive across web and mobile.

Open the player's profile or any of your shared games and click Report. Pick a reason (cheating, abusive chat, sandbagging, multi-accounting), and add details if relevant. Reports go to the moderation queue and are reviewed by humans. You won't see the outcome — privacy laws prevent us from sharing what action was taken — but the system tracks your reports and weights them appropriately.

Open Settings → Privacy → Delete account, or visit the help page at /help/delete-account. Deletion removes your profile, friends, messages, ratings, and personal data within thirty days. Game records visible to your former opponents are anonymized rather than removed, since deleting them would corrupt those opponents' game histories. Deletion is permanent — there's no recovery after it completes.

Yes — every game page has a Download PGN link. Your full game history is available as a single PGN file from Settings → Privacy → Export data. PGN is the standard chess format readable by every modern chess program. The export includes all games you've played, rated and unrated. Data exports are free and unlimited.

ChessHere requires accounts to be held by people aged thirteen and over, in line with global online-services age regulations. Children younger than thirteen can play through a parent's account but cannot hold their own. The platform follows GDPR-K and COPPA conventions on data minimization for younger users. The signup form asks for confirmation of age.

Two-factor authentication via authenticator app (TOTP) is on the roadmap; it isn't available in the current shipping build. For now, the strongest account-security choices are using a long unique password (a password manager helps) and enabling sign-in via Google or Apple, both of which support their own 2FA. Email-based recovery codes are sent for sensitive account changes.

Yes — the core platform is free. Live games, correspondence chess, tournaments, puzzles, Puzzle Rush, the opening trainer, the daily puzzle, profiles, messaging, the analysis board with engine, and all training tools work on the free tier with no ad interruption. Optional supporter and premium tiers exist for players who want to fund the project; they unlock cosmetic and convenience features, never core gameplay.

No — playing chess on ChessHere costs nothing. Sign up with an email or via Google/Apple, and you have immediate access to live games, correspondence, tournaments, puzzles, training tools, and everything else listed in the free tier. Some platforms gate basic features behind paid plans; ChessHere does not. Optional paid tiers exist as a way to support the project, not as a paywall over chess itself.