Comparison

Chess Tactics and Lessons vs OpeningTree

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

Head to head
About

Chess Tactics and Lessons

Master chess strategy and openings with this app. Practice unlimited tactics, follow detailed lessons, and save your favorite openings. Create your own content and learn from a supportive community.

Highlights
  • Unlimited tactics practice
  • Detailed chess lessons
  • Opening practice and saving
  • Create custom tactics and lessons
  • Learn from mistakes with explanations
  • Community comments and discussion
  • Customizable board design
Features
Read full description

“Chess is 99% tactics” (R. Teichmann.) From beginner to expert, practicing tactics is hands-down the best way to master the game. Play 30,000+ tactics, lessons, and openings while the app adjusts to your ability as you play. Join thousands of users who improve their game with daily tactics. Beginner-friendly, even if you don't know the rules of chess yet. "This app is a must have for any chess player - student or master." -Tom Taylor, USA "This is easily the best purchase I've made since owning a smartphone." -Miles C. Samuels, USA "This app has improved my game tremendously!" - anonymous fandom on the App Store FEATURES - Tactics: Play as many tactics as you want, for free. - Lessons: Get deeper into strategy with detailed lessons including positions from Netflix's 'The Queen's Gambit' and the World Championship. - Openings: Practice makes perfect! Save and practice openings from the Grandmasters and more. - Create your own tactics, lessons, and openings for others to try. - Learn from your mistakes with solutions, explanations, and chess engine analysis. - Join the community: comment on tactics and learn from other users. New tactics are added every day, so you'll never run out. ------ Chess Tactics PRO subscriptions will be charged to your iTunes account upon purchase. Subscriptions will automatically renew unless canceled within 24-hours before the end of the current period. You can cancel anytime with your iTunes account settings. See Privacy Policy and Terms of Service for more information. Privacy Policy: https://chesstacticsapp.com/privacy.html Terms of Service: https://chesstacticsapp.com/terms.html Acknowledgements: Chess Pieces by jurgenwesterhof on WikiCommons (adapted from work of Cburnett) Icons by bezier master, Cutiecon, and Shawn Wong from the Noun Project.

About

OpeningTree

Explore chess openings with an extensive opening book and engine analysis. Analyze your games, create custom lines, and study moves from high-rated players. Accessible for visually impaired users.

Highlights
  • Extensive opening book
  • Crafty engine analysis
  • Load and analyze PGN games
  • Create custom move lines
  • Accessible for visually impaired
  • Mark moves with colors
  • Save board to PGN
Features
Read full description

OpeningTree is a chess openings book based on high rated over the board games that lets one explore the tree of openings and engine analysis is available. Chess game files can be shared with the app to check against the book or to just view. Users can make their own side line moves and back up to return to main line. Also includes ten classic game collections and users can import their own games into the app. Game list are also searchable by tags. The updated opening book is compiled from 640,000 high rated games from recent years with both players rated 2300 and over. Just touch moves in the list or make moves on the board to see what the response is. The numbers next to moves indicate how many games resulted in wins-draws-losses. The idea comes from computer opening books as if we can open up the book and see what those moves are that people play in response to opening positions. Users do not pick an opening to study but start with the full tree. The analyze button on bottom right of board is to flip between viewing the openings move table or seeing Crafty engine analysis. +1.00 score means white is ahead a pawn. -1.00 score means black is ahead a pawn. There is a move now button to make the engine play the current best move if the users wants to try playing a position out against the engine. OpeningTree's board is accessible to the blind and visually impaired using Voice Over. With Voice Over enabled in device settings, tap on a square for info, double tap to select. Or choose from three move methods. When going forward in a loaded PGN game, moves will be announced on each tap of the forward button. Moves can be marked with colors(red, green, yellow) and colorizing a move at the end of a line will extend the line i.e. add move so it shows later. There is also an option to make a note on a position using the control bar. In the Actions menu if the user has imported a chess games file to the App, for example by opening a PGN file with OpeningTree from a mail attachment or download(long touch on the attachment/download for this option), a game from a PGN file can be loaded and checked against the book. If a user makes a new move, back up to the main line to return to the game. To ensure speed, it will only read/load a max of 5000 games. With bigger files users will only see first 5000 games. There is a Save Board to PGN option on the Actions menu. It saves the current moves to openings-user-games.pgn, a file OpeningTree will create on first save. Games are saved with opening name as white and black name to spot the lines in each game. This allows the users to export data out of the App such as favorite lines with the mail games option when looking at a game list. The App comes with six PGN game files that can be optionally installed when no PGN files have yet been opened by the App or the user has deleted their PGN files previously opened and likewise has none to access. If this is the case, this option shows when going to Actions -> load PGN. The files contain a mix of famous classical games, collections of former world champions Gary Kasparov and Magnus Carlsen's games and more recent games from two top ranked international tournaments. PGN stands for portable game notation. It's a file extension that can be used with text files that contain chess games in the PGN format. PGN files can be read by apps to display the games in them. If a game is loaded in the App one can then go to 'Actions -> show game data' to view the raw PGN text.

Screenshots

Chess Tactics and Lessons4 screens
OpeningTree4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Chess Tactics and Lessons at Free against OpeningTree's $0.99. Chess Tactics and Lessons also leads on rating (4.8 vs 4.4) and ratings volume (5K vs 31). OpeningTree's advantage is in-app purchases (none vs 7) and iOS requirement (15.6 vs 26.0). On review sentiment, 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

Chess Tactics and Lessons is free to download; OpeningTree costs $0.99 up front. Chess Tactics and Lessons sells 7 in-app purchases, starting at $3.99 per month. OpeningTree asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

Chess Tactics and Lessons holds the better App Store score, 4.8 against 4.4. That said, the two scores are not equally well evidenced: Chess Tactics and Lessons has 5K ratings behind it against 31, so its average is the more settled of the two. Written reviews point the same way: 85% of Chess Tactics and Lessons's written reviews are positive against 83% of OpeningTree's.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

Chess Tactics and Lessons ships an update every 5 weeks, OpeningTree every 2 months. The most recent releases landed on October 19, 2026 and October 15, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard6 real differences · 4 level
Chess Tactics and Lessons versus OpeningTree: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterChess Tactics and LessonsOpeningTree
PriceFree — better$0.99
Rating4.8 (5K ratings) — better4.4 (31 ratings)
Positive reviews85.2% of reviews — better83.3% of reviews
Number of ratings5K — better31
Update frequencyEvery 5 weeks — betterEvery 2 months
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFree with in-app purchases — betterPaid
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS26.015.6 — better
Further details — not scored
Size114 MB52 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperLockwood Productions, LLCMichael Adams

Customer experience

Chess Tactics and Lessons

All ratings4,985 ratings
Positive95.2%
Neutral3.0%
Negative1.7%
Written reviews283 reviews
Positive85.2%
Neutral4.6%
Negative10.2%

OpeningTree

All ratings31 ratings
Positive83.9%
Neutral6.5%
Negative9.7%
Written reviews24 reviews
Positive83.3%
Neutral4.2%
Negative12.5%

Bugs and requests

Chess Tactics and Lessons

Reported bugs

4 issues
  • Server connection issues
  • White screen after updates
  • Inability to delete account
  • Incorrect move explanations

Requested features

5 requests
  • Ability to save tactics
  • Offline mode
  • Difficulty filtering
  • Improved user interface
  • More comprehensive lessons

OpeningTree

Not enough reviews yet to summarise bugs or requests.

In-app purchases

7 purchases

Chess Tactics and Lessons

Subscriptions2
  • Monthly PRO Subscription$3.991 Month
  • Annual Pro Subscription$29.991 Year
One-time5
  • Marble Chess Board$0.99
  • Orange Chess Board$0.99
  • Remove ads$0.99
Show 2 more
  • Green Chess Board$0.99
  • Enable Saved Puzzles$1.99
None

OpeningTree

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Chess Tactics and Lessons free?
Chess Tactics and Lessons is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is OpeningTree free?
OpeningTree costs $0.99, with no in-app purchases.
Which has better reviews, Chess Tactics and Lessons or OpeningTree?
Chess Tactics and Lessons is rated higher. Chess Tactics and Lessons averages 4.8 out of 5 from 5K ratings, while OpeningTree averages 4.4 from 31 ratings.
Do Chess Tactics and Lessons or OpeningTree have ads?
Neither Chess Tactics and Lessons nor OpeningTree shows ads.
Which is updated more often, Chess Tactics and Lessons or OpeningTree?
Chess Tactics and Lessons ships an update every 5 weeks, and OpeningTree every 2 months. Most recently, Chess Tactics and Lessons was updated on October 19, 2026 and OpeningTree on October 15, 2026.

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