Chess Problems Lite vs Chess. Scandinavian Defense
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both games, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
Chess Problems Lite
Sharpen your chess skills with directmate puzzles. This app offers 10 interactive problems, from easy mate-in-one to challenging mate-in-four moves. It features a revamped chess engine, a timing clock, customizable piece sets and color schemes, and social leaderboards with Facebook integration.
- Directmate chess puzzles
- Mate in 1 to 4+ moves
- Revamped chess engine
- Timing clock for puzzles
- Customizable piece sets and color schemes
- Leaderboards and Facebook integration
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A lite version of the Ultimate mate in 1 to 4+ chess puzzle apps! Sharpen your chess skills! Beginners and experienced players will enjoy solving these chess problems! This app has 10 interactive chess problems ranging from easy mate in one move problems to very challenging mate in four moves. The object is to finish each game by forcing a checkmate in a given number of moves. In the full versions of this app there are a much larger number of classical puzzles collected from a variety of sources. These puzzles are fun to play and can be enjoyed at your leisure on your iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad. Chess problems are especially useful for learning to play chess or anyone wanting to improve their skills. New features added include: ------------------------------ - Completely revamped chess engine that is much stronger - Timing clock is displayed while you are working on each puzzle. How long you take to solve a puzzle is stored. - New options: more chess piece sets (total of 7) and more colors schemes (total of 7) including wood and marble. (Improved the options menu as well) - Social Gaming: Leaderboards to compare the number of puzzles you have solved with your friends and other players. Facebook integration - including the ability to post your progress and ask your friends for help on a puzzle. - Universal app - works on iPhone, iPod Touch, and iPad - high resolution graphics all around (where supported). For even more chess puzzle challenges check out these apps: - Mate in 1 Puzzles - Mate in 2 Puzzles - Mate in 3 Puzzles - Mate in 4+ Puzzles
Chess. Scandinavian Defense
This chess training course focuses on the sharp variations of the Scandinavian defense. It offers a deep theoretical and practical overview with numerous exercises to reinforce knowledge. The program acts as a coach, providing hints, explanations, and refutations for mistakes.
- Deep theoretical and practical overview
- 261 exercises to reinforce knowledge
- Interactive theoretical lessons
- Hints, explanations, and refutations
- Play out positions against the computer
- Monitors ELO rating changes
- Offline play
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This course is aimed at club and intermediate players and presents the theory and playing hooks in the most sharp and deciding variations of the Scandinavian defense developing after moves 1. e4 d5. The course presents a deep theoretical and practical overview of the actual variations, featuring 28 examples. Numerous new exercises provide a great opportunity to reinforce your knowledge: 261 exercises in total. This course is in the series Chess King Learn (https://learn.chessking.com/), which is an unprecedented chess teaching method. In the series are included courses in tactics, strategy, openings, middle game, and endgame, split by levels from beginners to experienced players, and even professional players. With the help of this course, you can improve your chess knowledge, learn new tactical tricks and combinations, and consolidate the acquired knowledge into practice. The program acts as a coach who gives tasks to solve and helps to solve them if you get stuck. It will give you hints, explanations and show you even striking refutation of the mistakes you might make. The program also contains a theoretical section, which explains the methods of the game in a certain stage of the game, based on actual examples. The theory is presented in an interactive way, which means you can not only read the text of the lessons, but also to make moves on the board and work out unclear moves on the board. Advantages of the program: • High quality examples, all double-checked for correctness • You need to enter all key moves, required by the teacher • Different levels of complexity of the tasks • Various goals, which need to be reached in the problems • The program gives hint if an error is made • For typical mistaken moves, the refutation is shown • You can play out any position of the tasks against the computer • Interactive theoretical lessons • Structured table of contents • The program monitors the change in the rating (ELO) of the player during the learning process • Test mode with flexible settings • Possibility to bookmark favorite exercises • The application is adapted to the bigger screen of a tablet • The application does not require an internet connection The course includes a free part, in which you can test the program. Lessons offered in the free version is fully functional. They allow you to test the application in real world conditions before releasing the following topics: 1. Scandinavian defense 1.1. 1. e4 d5 2. ed Nf6 1.2. 1. e4 d5 2. ed Qd5 3. NC3 Qa5 4. d4 Nf6 5. Nf3 Bg4 1.3. 1. e4 d5 2. ed Qd5 3. NC3 Qa5 4. d4 Nf6 5. Nf3 Nc6 1.4. 1. e4 d5 2. ed Qd5 3. NC3 Qa5 4. d4 Nf6 5. Nf3 c6 1.5. 1. e4 d5 2. ed Qd5 3. Nc3 Qd6 1.6. Other variations 2. Scandinavian defense - theory 2.1. System with 2. ed Q:d5 2.2. System with 2. ed Nf6 2.3. Exemplary games
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is rating: Chess. Scandinavian Defense at 4.8 against Chess Problems Lite's 4.3. Chess. Scandinavian Defense also leads on iOS requirement (8.0 vs 13.0). Chess Problems Lite's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 1). On price, ratings volume, update cadence and ads 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
Both are free to download. Chess. Scandinavian Defense sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. Chess Problems Lite asks for nothing beyond the download.
Chess. Scandinavian Defense holds the better App Store score, 4.8 against 4.3. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 8 and 17 respectively.
Chess Problems Lite ships an update every 7 months, Chess. Scandinavian Defense every 4 months. The most recent releases landed on October 23, 2026 and October 21, 2026 respectively.
| Parameter | Chess Problems Lite | Chess. Scandinavian Defense |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | 4.3 (8 ratings) | 4.8 (17 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 83.3% of reviews | — |
| Number of ratings | 8 | 17 — better |
| Update frequency | Every 7 months | Every 4 months — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Free | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 13.0 | 8.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 7 MB | 43 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Gano Technologies LLC | Chess King |
Customer experience
Chess Problems Lite
Chess. Scandinavian Defense
In-app purchases
Chess Problems Lite
No in-app purchases
Chess. Scandinavian Defense
- Full course$3.99
Questions
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Is Chess. Scandinavian Defense free?
Which has better reviews, Chess Problems Lite or Chess. Scandinavian Defense?
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