Comparison

MindChess vs Zenmate

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

Head to head
About

MindChess

Enhance your chess skills with daily training sessions, tactical puzzles, and bot matches. Analyze your games, build opening repertoires, and track your progress with detailed statistics. This app offers a comprehensive suite of tools for chess improvement.

Highlights
  • Daily chess training drills
  • Themed tactical puzzles
  • Play against AI bots
  • Import and analyze your games
  • Opening repertoire builder
  • Progress tracking and statistics
  • Home and Lock Screen widgets
Features
Read full description

MindChess is a daily chess gym and a study companion. Train board vision, memory and calculation in 60-second sessions, sharpen your tactics, play bots, and take what you learn to your own games. THE GYM • Thirteen short drills: Square Color, Coordinates, Same Color, Same Diagonal, Bishop Captures, Two Knights, Collision, Memory, Mate in 1, Fork Finder, Piece Snapshot, Knight Distance and Opening Flash. • Timed mode (60 seconds, Game Center leaderboards) and Training mode (3 lives). • A daily challenge and a daily streak, with streak freezes and an optional reminder. • 39 achievements: badges at 10, 50 and 100 games of every drill, also in Game Center. TACTICS • Themed puzzles in four modes: Rated, with your own tactics rating; Practice, with free hints; Streak, until your first miss; and Time trial, 3 or 5 minutes with 3 lives. • Pick one of 24 themes or Mix, and review the puzzles you miss. PLAY BOTS • Nine characters with their own style, from beginner to advanced, plus Stockfish at the strength you choose. • Download the free Maia-2 model and some bots play like people at their level. Everything runs on your device. YOUR GAMES • Connect your Lichess or Chess.com account and import your games. • Game databases, PGN import and a viewer with variations, notes and marks. • Analysis: Stockfish 19 on your device, offline, with an evaluation bar and the top 3 lines. With Pro, the game report marks your mistakes, the key moments and your brilliant moves. OPENINGS • Repertoire: play through your lines and the app brings each one back right before you'd forget it. • Learn mode walks you through every new line, with its comments and arrows, before the first question. • Opening explorer: what Masters, Lichess players and you have played from any position, with a linked Lichess account. Save the moves to your repertoire. PROGRESS AND TOOLS • Statistics that tell you what to improve in your training, repertoire and games. • Widgets for your Home Screen and Lock Screen: daily challenge, reviews, streak, personal bests and shortcuts. • Diagram scanner: snap a diagram and get the position ready to edit. Free. • Chess clock: increments, stages and time odds, for games with your phone on the table. • Notation your way: English, Spanish or figurines. The same board, with your look, across the app. ON EVERY SCREEN MindChess works on iPhone, iPad, iPhone Duo and Mac. MINDCHESS PRO Pro unlocks every drill, tactics and bots with no daily limit, Stockfish analysis and the game report, unlimited repertoires, lines and imports, lines from your own games, full statistics, unlimited game databases and clock controls, and 11 Pro piece sets. Free stays useful: the basic drills, 15 tactics puzzles a day, a daily game against the beginner bots, game import, the opening explorer, the scanner and the PGN viewer. MindChess is not an online chess server. It is the place where you train between your games. Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/

About

Zenmate

Features
Read full description

Zenmate is a calm, beautifully designed chess app built for focused play. Play a quiet game against the AI, start a match with friends through Game Center, or pass-and-play on one device. Zenmate keeps the interface simple and refined so the board stays central and every move has room to breathe. Features: - Play vs AI with multiple difficulty levels - Play with friends using Game Center - Local 2-player pass-and-play - Light and dark mode - Optional board coordinates - Flip board support - Clean timers and move-focused gameplay A quiet game of kings. Designed to slow you down, one move at a time.

Screenshots

MindChess4 screens
Zenmate4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Zenmate at none against MindChess's 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. MindChess sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $0.99 per month. Zenmate asks for nothing beyond the download.

UpkeepUpdate frequency

MindChess ships an update every 3 weeks, Zenmate every 6 weeks. The most recent releases landed on November 5, 2026 and October 31, 2026 respectively.

Scorecard1 real difference · 8 level
MindChess versus Zenmate: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterMindChessZenmate
PriceFreeFree
Rating5.0 (1 ratings) — better—
Number of ratings1 — better—
Update frequencyEvery 3 weeks — betterEvery 6 weeks
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesYesNo — better
MonetizationFreemium—
DevicesiPhone, iPad, Mac — betteriPhone, iPad
Requires iOS18.017.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size150 MB4 MB
Age rating4+4+
Developeromar megdadiTimothy Nice

In-app purchases

2 purchases

MindChess

Subscriptions2
  • Monthly subscription$0.991 Month
  • Yearly subscription$9.991 Year
None

Zenmate

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is MindChess free?
MindChess is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Is Zenmate free?
Zenmate is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do MindChess or Zenmate have ads?
Neither MindChess nor Zenmate shows ads.
Which is updated more often, MindChess or Zenmate?
MindChess ships an update every 3 weeks, and Zenmate every 6 weeks. Most recently, MindChess was updated on November 5, 2026 and Zenmate on October 31, 2026.

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