ChessLab vs Stockfish AI Chess
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both games, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
ChessLab
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Completely free, no ads, no account: nothing leaves your device. ChessLab is a complete chess companion for iPhone and iPad: play, analyse, train and experiment, with Stockfish built in, without ever leaving the app. OPPONENTS THAT PLAY LIKE HUMANS Nine characters played by Maia-3, a network trained on millions of human games: it does not look for the best move, it plays the one a human of that level would play, blunders included. Each has a style, a repertoire and a temperament, and a level set on the human scale. Or take on Stockfish, from beginner (~900 Elo) to maximum (~3190). Optional clock, hints, a warning before risky moves and an evaluation bar, all on demand. ANALYSE AND UNDERSTAND Every move is graded (inaccuracy, mistake, blunder, brilliant…), each player gets an accuracy score, and the app tells you why a move was bad. The Coach adds the share of players at your level who play it. At the end, it offers to turn your mistakes and missed mates into puzzles. Load a game by PGN, FEN, position editor or photo scanner. DAILY SESSION Every day, what to review: opening positions that are due, missed puzzles, an endgame. A streak of days and medals to keep you going. OPENINGS 58 hand-written openings (bilingual), checked against the engine: every move is explained, coloured arrows tie the board to the move list, and spaced repetition makes them stick. Import your own repertoires as PGN too. ENDGAMES 78 courses proven by endgame tablebases: no move taught gives up a win, no defence offered loses a draw. Plus free training, where any move that keeps the verdict is accepted. PUZZLES Over 130,000 problems from the Lichess database, filtered by level and theme, plus your own: drawn from your mistakes, or imported from your own PGN files. Personal rating and “At my level”. VARIANTS AND MORE Chess960 and eleven variants against the computer (King of the Hill, Three-Check, Horde, Atomic, Crazyhouse, Duck Chess, Barricades…), each with its own analysis. Two-player mode, and a Laboratory to compare two Stockfish settings. IPHONE AND IPAD A large board with side-by-side panels on iPad, keyboard and trackpad, portrait and landscape. Fully bilingual, French and English. Optional iCloud sync, off by default. PRIVACY Offline by default: no ChessLab server, no analytics, no ads. Your games stay on your device. ChessLab embeds the Stockfish engine (GPLv3 license), the University of Toronto's Maia-3 network (AGPLv3 license) and free vector piece sets — cburnett (GPLv2+/CC BY-SA), chessnut (Apache 2.0) and merida (GPLv2+). Full source code and license notices are available from within the app (Settings → Licenses).
Stockfish AI Chess
Play, learn, and analyze chess games offline with powerful AI engines. Offers 19 difficulty levels, a Chess Coach for feedback, and game review to study mistakes. Supports PGN import/export and FEN positions.
- Offline AI chess play
- 19 difficulty levels
- Chess Coach feedback
- Game review and analysis
- PGN/FEN support
- Board photo to position
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Play chess, analyze your games and practice on iPhone and iPad with Stockfish 19 and 10 engines running on your device. Choose among 19 difficulty levels in Stockfish, explore openings, or arrange engine matches and tournaments. Enable the optional Chess Coach for feedback on your moves. Use Game Review to study mistakes and suggested continuations. Evaluations are engine estimates, not official player ratings. Turn a board photo into a position for analysis; check and correct the recognized pieces. Physical-board recognition is experimental. Save, import and export PGN games, and copy FEN positions. Play, analysis, coaching and photo processing work offline without uploading games or photos. Public-game imports and optional endgame database downloads require internet access. Independently developed by Tughan Y. Karsli. Not an official app of the Stockfish project.
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is update cadence: Stockfish AI Chess at daily against ChessLab's weekly. 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
Both are free to download. Neither carries in-app purchases, so what you see is what you pay.
ChessLab ships an update weekly, Stockfish AI Chess daily. Both last shipped on November 6, 2026.
| Parameter | ChessLab | Stockfish AI Chess |
|---|---|---|
| Price | Free | Free |
| Rating | — | 5.0 (18 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | — | 100.0% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | — | 18 — better |
| Update frequency | Weekly | Daily — better |
| Ads | No | No |
| In-app purchases | No | No |
| Monetization | — | Free |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad | iPhone, iPad |
| Requires iOS | 18.0 | 17.0 — better |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 175 MB | 943 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Thierry Maeder | Tughan Yusuf Karsli |
In-app purchases
ChessLab
No in-app purchases
Stockfish AI Chess
No in-app purchases
Questions
Is ChessLab free?
Is Stockfish AI Chess free?
Do ChessLab or Stockfish AI Chess have ads?
Which is updated more often, ChessLab or Stockfish AI Chess?
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