Comparison

Gambit vs Airplane Chess

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

Head to head
About

Gambit

Explore classic chess and five unique variants on a single board. Play against AI with adjustable difficulty, with friends offline, or online against others. Features include post-game analysis and a library of famous games.

Highlights
  • Classic Chess
  • Five Chess Variants
  • Computer AI Play
  • Pass-and-Play Mode
  • Online Multiplayer
  • Post-Game Analysis
  • Famous Game Library
Features
Read full description

Gambit is chess — and five chess worlds beyond it. One clean board, every way to play. GAME TYPES • Classic Chess — full rules: castling, en passant, promotion, draws. • Fischer Random (Chess960) — randomized back rank with generalized castling. • Open Borders (Horde) — 36 pawns storm a full army. • Turnabout (Crazyhouse) — capture a piece, then drop it back as your own. • Siamese (Bughouse) — two boards, captured pieces feed your partner. • Star Trek Tri-D — three-dimensional chess across seven boards. WAYS TO PLAY • Computer — five difficulty levels, from a gentle start to a real fight. Moves are instant. • Pass-and-play — two players on one device. • Online — invite a friend with a link, or find a match automatically. Live clocks, resign and draw offers, and you can watch other live games. MORE • Eight board themes. • Post-game analysis — an evaluation graph and move-quality marks. • A library of famous games to replay. • Optional cross-device game history with "Sign in with Knomee." No account is required to play. Sign in only if you want your game history synced across devices.

About

Airplane Chess

Features
Read full description

Airplane Chess is chess for the places a network doesn't reach — a plane, a bus, a tunnel, a car on a long road. Nothing it does needs a server. There are no accounts to make, no ads, no tracking, and no connection to drop halfway through a game. THREE WAYS TO PLAY • Against the computer, at three levels. It thinks at a human pace rather than answering the instant you move. • Pass and play, one phone between two people, the board turning to face whoever is to move. • Two phones side by side, with no network of any kind — over Bluetooth, and between iPhones over Apple's peer-to-peer Wi-Fi as well. Paired players get a lobby: play a game, or just talk. THE WHOLE GAME, PROPERLY Castling, en passant and promotion. Stalemate, insufficient material, threefold repetition and the fifty-move rule — every way a game of chess can end, including the ones most apps quietly skip. Take a move back, resign, or offer a draw. A game you walk away from is still there when you come back, even if the phone restarted in between. Finished games are kept. Step through any of them a move at a time, or send one out as PGN — the format lichess and chess.com both read. IN TEN LANGUAGES Catalan, Dutch, English, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Polish, Brazilian Portuguese and Spanish, following your phone unless you tell it otherwise. There is a short guide to the app and to the rules of chess in every one of them. NOTHING TO SET UP No sign-in and no account. A one-minute tour of the board the first time you open it, offered rather than forced, and skippable in one tap. Playing a phone nearby asks for Bluetooth the first time and nothing else — never your location.

Screenshots

Gambit4 screens
Airplane Chess4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is iOS requirement: Airplane Chess at 15.1 against Gambit's 17.0. On price, ads, in-app purchases 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. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.

Scorecard1 real difference · 8 level
Gambit versus Airplane Chess: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterGambitAirplane Chess
PriceFreeFree
Rating5.0 (1 ratings) — better—
Number of ratings1 — better—
Update frequencyEvery 2 months—
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNoNo
MonetizationFree—
DevicesiPhone, iPadiPhone, iPad, iPod — better
Requires iOS17.015.1 — better
Further details — not scored
Size7 MB26 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperJoseph MalonePaulo Henrique Carvalho Bing

In-app purchases

None

Gambit

No in-app purchases

None

Airplane Chess

No in-app purchases

Questions

Is Gambit free?
Gambit is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is Airplane Chess free?
Airplane Chess is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Do Gambit or Airplane Chess have ads?
Neither Gambit nor Airplane Chess shows ads.

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