Comparison

Aimchess vs Chess Max Academy

Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both apps, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.

Head to head
About

Aimchess

Enhance your chess skills with advanced analytics and personalized training. Connect your existing chess accounts to receive tailored study plans based on your game history. Master tactics, openings, and endgames with adaptive exercises and expert-prepared content.

Highlights
  • Personalized Study Plans
  • Game Analysis
  • Adaptive Tactics Puzzles
  • Blindfold Tactics
  • Checkmate Flash Cards
  • Grandmaster Content
Features
Read full description

Improve your Chess with next level analysis and focused training. Say goodbye to questions like “Why am I losing?” or “What should I be working on?” Let us guide you through the next stage in your chess improvement journey! With our dedicated suite of detailed analytic tools that can connect with any of your favourite online chess platforms, like Chess.com, Chess24 or Lichess, we can develop a unique Personalized Study Plan and targeted training options based on your own games. You can progress your chess faster than ever with Aimchess. ANALYTICS Connect your Chess.com, Lichess or Chess24 account for instant analysis of your online games. Get breakdowns on your performance in key areas such as Openings, Tactics, Endings, Advantage Capitalization, Resourcefulness and Time Management. See how you compare to other Chess players in your range, to really understand what areas you need to improve on. Opening Breakdowns. Find out which openings work for you, and where you need to put more work in. UNIQUE TRAINING EXERCISES Adaptive Tactics. Everyone loves Chess Puzzles! With Aimchess our Tactics Puzzles adapt to your strengths and weaknesses. Struggling with specific kinds of puzzles? We’ll show you them more often so you can make the most of your training time. Is one particular puzzle giving you difficulty? We’ll show it to you again a little later so you can prove that you’ve learned from your mistakes! Blindfold Tactics. Are normal Tactics Puzzles too easy? Test your skills with our Blindfold Tactics, where you have to visualise and solve the position simultaneously! Blunder Preventer. Given two possible moves, do you think you can spot the blunder? It’s not always as easy as you’d think! 360 Trainer. These aren’t your Grandfather’s Tactics Puzzles, instead these positions will really test your skills with offensive & defensive tactics, equal positions and mistakes from your past games. With no clear material gains available even the smallest positional advantage could be the right move! Practice Visualisation. Memorize a board and then answer questions about where the pieces were, how many undefended pieces there were, or even what moves you need to make to capture certain pieces. Checkmate Flash Cards. Run through a series of mates that all great Chess Players need to know, can you get them all right and beat your best time? Much More. Also included in our Training Room is our Opening Improver, Advantage Capitalization Trainer, Endgames, Intuition Trainer, Retry Mistakes, Defender and Time Trainer. OTHER FEATURES Discover a world of tactical chess content, prepared by Grandmasters, in the Explore section of Aimchess. Learn everything from basic checkmates, to high level theoretical concepts. With interactive tutorials and exercises, you can make sure the ideas stick! Warm Up for your games with a rapid fire puzzles gauntlet designed to get your chess brain working so you can hit the ground running against your opponents! Dedicated workouts to help improve your Focus and Tactical thinking. Personalized Training Plans help keep you on the right track with regular targets for games to be played and exercises to be completed. PREMIUM DETAILS Aimchess’ Free Tier allows you to do any 15 lessons per day in the Training Room or via the daily Personalized Workouts. You also get limited access to Scouting Reports and Statistics. Aimchess Premium allows you access to unlimited exercises in the Training Room and full access to all of our Statistical Analysis tools. Monthly Subscriptions are $9.99 per month, or get an Annual Subscription for $71.99 (Equivalent to $5.99 per month) Premium subscription is paid from your iTunes account at the time of purchase with automatic renewal every 30 days. Auto-renewal and write-off of money for a new period occurs within 24 hours immediately before the subscription expires. Auto-renewal can be disabled in the iTunes account settings on your device.

About

Chess Max Academy

Learn chess through interactive courses and activities. Engage with explanations, puzzles, and practice games to improve your skills. Designed for various learning levels, it makes understanding chess concepts easy and fun.

Highlights
  • Interactive chess courses
  • Activity-based learning
  • Explanation activities
  • Capture activities
  • Puzzle and tactics solving
  • Multiple-choice quizzes
  • Play against computer
Features
Read full description

It's time to learn interactive chess courses with activity-based solving! Our courses have hundreds of activities from various learning levels. The different types of interactive activities help you digest the information easily. 1) Explanation Activity: This will teach you a concept in a concise way. 2) Capture Activity: The most fun and engaging way to learn piece movements and captures. 3) Puzzle Activity: Solve interesting puzzles and tactics from a given position. 4) MCQ Activity: Test your knowledge with quiz-based multiple-choice questions. 5) Play with Computer: Train your skills by practicing must-know positions with the computer.

Screenshots

Aimchess4 screens
Chess Max Academy4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is review sentiment: Chess Max Academy at 100% against Aimchess's 51%. Chess Max Academy also leads on rating (5.0 vs 3.9) and in-app purchases (none vs 2). Aimchess's advantage is ratings volume (197 vs 2). On price, update cadence, ads and device support there is nothing between them.

Scored on Price · Rating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings · Update frequency · Ads · In-app purchases · Monetization · Best chart rank · Devices · Requires iOS

CostPrice · In-app purchases · Ads · Monetization

Both are free to download. Aimchess sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $9.99 per month. Chess Max Academy asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Chess Max Academy holds the better App Store score, 5.0 against 3.9. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Aimchess has 197 ratings behind it against 2, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 51% of Aimchess's written reviews are positive against 100% of Chess Max Academy's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Aimchess ships an update monthly, Chess Max Academy every 3 weeks. Both last shipped on November 3, 2026.

Scorecard6 real differences · 4 level
Aimchess versus Chess Max Academy: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterAimchessChess Max Academy
PriceFreeFree
Rating3.9 (197 ratings)5.0 (2 ratings) — better
Positive reviews50.9% of reviews100.0% of reviews — better
Number of ratings197 — better2
Update frequencyMonthlyEvery 3 weeks — better
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFree with in-app purchasesFree — better
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS14.012.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size8 MB86 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperChess.com, LLCChess Max Nexus Inc

Customer experience

Aimchess

All ratings195 ratings
Positive70.3%
Neutral8.2%
Negative21.5%
Written reviews108 reviews
Positive50.9%
Neutral9.3%
Negative39.8%

Chess Max Academy

All ratings2 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews1 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

Bugs and requests

Aimchess

Reported bugs

16 issues
  • App crashes when attempting to purchase premium subscription
  • Logout occurring once per week
  • Theme settings not persisting across sessions
  • Full-screen white flash on app open
  • App closes when selecting monthly subscription option
Show 11 more
  • Premium access lost after purchase through Apple
  • Cannot update chess.com username in app
  • Puzzle pieces freeze and move to incorrect squares
  • Blank board appearing in 360 trainer
  • Analysis navigation buttons not functioning
  • Subscription charges continuing after cancellation
  • Inability to delete account
  • App unavailable/down for extended periods
  • Incorrect puzzle solutions marked as wrong
  • Lag when using analysis tool
  • Free version asks for payment before completing daily plan

Requested features

17 requests
  • Better UI/UX organization and progressive disclosure
  • Ability to save and review previous exercises
  • Explanations for why moves are correct or incorrect
  • Hint limiter for playground mode
  • Daily streak tracker like Duolingo
Show 12 more
  • Progress bar and countdown for daily training plans
  • Ability to go back one move in opening trainer instead of restarting
  • Export to PGN format
  • Endgame training module
  • Guess the ELO and guess the advantage training modes
  • Force complete sequence commitment before showing results in tactics
  • iPad portrait mode board optimization
  • Account username update functionality
  • Better graph legends with clear units and explanations
  • Infinite workout mode with mixed exercises
  • Visible ratings for all exercise types
  • Automatic game analysis queue for new games

Chess Max Academy

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

2 purchases

Aimchess

Subscriptions2
  • Premium Membership$9.991 Month
  • Annual Premium Membership$71.991 Year
None

Chess Max Academy

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Aimchess free?
Aimchess is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Chess Max Academy free?
Chess Max Academy is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Aimchess or Chess Max Academy?
Chess Max Academy is rated higher. Aimchess averages 3.9 out of 5 from 197 ratings, while Chess Max Academy averages 5.0 from 2 ratings.
Do Aimchess or Chess Max Academy have ads?
Neither Aimchess nor Chess Max Academy shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Aimchess or Chess Max Academy?
Aimchess ships an update monthly, and Chess Max Academy every 3 weeks. Most recently, Aimchess was updated on November 3, 2026 and Chess Max Academy on November 3, 2026.

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