Comparison

Serene Chess vs CloudChess

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

Head to head
About

Serene Chess

Engage in deep chess play with a powerful engine and thousands of tactics puzzles. Analyze your games with detailed reviews and practice specific chess concepts. Enjoy a calm, offline experience with no ads or data collection.

Highlights
  • Tunable chess engine opponent
  • Thousands of tactics puzzles
  • Detailed game review and analysis
  • Offline play with no account required
  • Practice specific chess tactics
  • Calm and distraction-free interface
Features
Read full description

Serene Chess is a calm space for deep play: a strong engine, four thousand tactics puzzles, and a review that shows you where the game actually turned. Everything works offline, with no account, no ads, and no data collected. PLAY • A tunable opponent, from a gentle club player to full strength • Three playing styles: Defender, Balanced, Aggressor • Hints, takebacks, draw offers, resignation, and PGN sharing • Your opening named as you play it, from the standard ECO tables PUZZLES • 4,000 tactics puzzles bundled in the app and playable anywhere • Four difficulty bands, from Gentle to Severe • Choose the idea you want to practise: forks, pins, skewers, deflection, back-rank mates, endgames • A new puzzle every day, with streaks and honest progress REVIEW • The engine walks back through your finished game, move by move • Accuracy for both sides, and the moments that decided the result • See what the engine would have played instead • Tap any moment to jump straight to that position on the board QUIET BY DESIGN Soft wood tones, an evaluation bar you can switch off, gentle haptics, and a dark mode that stays dark. Nothing flashes, nothing nags, nothing is sold to you. Stockfish runs entirely on your device. No account, no network, no analytics: your games never leave your phone.

About

CloudChess

Engage in endless chess puzzles with adaptive challenges on various board sizes. Practice checkmates, get hints, and analyze moves offline. Enjoy a night mode and keep your progress locally without an account.

Highlights
  • Adaptive chess puzzles
  • Classic and custom board sizes
  • Checkmate practice
  • Hints and move undo
  • Offline puzzle generation
  • Night mode
Read full description

Chess puzzles in the clouds. Find checkmates and winning moves on beautifully animated boards. CloudChess adapts the challenge as you play, with classic and smaller board sizes to keep each puzzle fresh. • Practice checkmates and short winning continuations. • Play on square and rectangular boards, from 4×4 to 8×8. • Get hints, undo moves and learn from each attempt. • Generate and analyse puzzles directly on your device. • Switch to night mode with one tap. • Keep your progress on your device. No CloudChess account required. Play 6 new puzzles per rolling hour for free on this device. An optional CloudChess Unlimited subscription gives you unlimited puzzles while active. CloudChess Unlimited is a monthly auto-renewing subscription. The price is shown before purchase. Payment is charged to your Apple Account. Your subscription renews unless cancelled at least 24 hours before the current period ends. Manage or cancel it in your Apple Account settings. Privacy: https://kostakarathana.github.io/cloudchess-support/privacy.html Terms: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/ Support: kostakarathanasopoulos@proton.me

Screenshots

Serene Chess4 screens
CloudChess4 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is in-app purchases: Serene Chess at none against CloudChess's 1. Serene Chess also leads on iOS requirement (15.0 vs 17.0). On price, rating, review sentiment and ratings volume 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. CloudChess sells 1 in-app purchase, starting at $7.99 per month. Serene Chess asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

On the App Store both sit at effectively the same score — 5.0 for Serene Chess against 5.0 for CloudChess. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 1 and 2 respectively. Written reviews split almost evenly too, at 100% and 100% positive.

Scorecard3 real differences · 7 level
Serene Chess versus CloudChess: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterSerene ChessCloudChess
PriceFreeFree
Rating5.0 (1 ratings)5.0 (2 ratings)
Positive reviews100.0% of reviews100.0% of reviews
Number of ratings12 — better
Update frequency—Every 2 days
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationFree — betterFreemium
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPod — betteriPhone, iPad
Requires iOS15.0 — better17.0
Further details — not scored
Size11 MB391 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperWilliam AlstonKosta Karathanasopoulos

Customer experience

Serene Chess

All ratings1 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews1 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

CloudChess

All ratings1 ratings
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%
Written reviews2 reviews
Positive100.0%
Neutral0.0%
Negative0.0%

In-app purchases

None

Serene Chess

No in-app purchases

1 purchases

CloudChess

Subscriptions1
  • CloudChess Unlimited$7.991 Month

Questions

Is Serene Chess free?
Serene Chess is free to download, with no in-app purchases.
Is CloudChess free?
CloudChess is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, Serene Chess or CloudChess?
Serene Chess and CloudChess are both rated 5.0 out of 5 on the App Store, from 1 and 2 ratings respectively.
Do Serene Chess or CloudChess have ads?
Neither Serene Chess nor CloudChess shows ads.

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