Comparison

OpeningTree vs Chess Openings Trainer

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

Head to head
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
Currently charting
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.

About

Chess Openings Trainer

Master chess openings with an intuitive interface and a vast database of strategies. Practice against an AI, explore variations, and gain confidence in your gameplay.

Highlights
  • Database of over 3,000 openings
  • 500 opening descriptions
  • Intuitive interface
  • Practice against AI
  • Stockfish engine evaluation
Features
Read full description

Learning chess openings should be intuitive and simple! Welcome to Chess Openings Trainer. With a database of more than 3,000 openings, 500 descriptions and an intuitive interface that displays the strongest replies to most well-known variations, Chess Openings Trainer will get you playing the Sicilian Defense or the King's Gambit with confidence in no time! * Explore openings directly from the chess board, no side panels, no complicated statistics * Practice openings against a tireless AI * Every move has been evaluated by Stockfish, the strongest chess engine in the world You can optionally support our work by purchasing the Pro version from within the app's settings (a one-time, lifetime purchase, not a subscription)

Screenshots

OpeningTree4 screens
Chess Openings Trainer3 screens

Verdict

The call

The clearest difference is price: Chess Openings Trainer at Free against OpeningTree's $0.99. OpeningTree's advantage is rating (4.4 vs 3.9) and in-app purchases (none vs 1). On ratings volume, ads, device support and iOS requirement 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 Openings Trainer is free to download; OpeningTree costs $0.99 up front. Chess Openings Trainer sells 1 one-off in-app purchase. OpeningTree asks for nothing beyond the download.

ReceptionRating · Positive reviews · Number of ratings

OpeningTree holds the better App Store score, 4.4 against 3.9. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 31 and 17 respectively. Written reviews point the same way: 83% of OpeningTree's written reviews are positive against 57% of Chess Openings Trainer's.

Scorecard6 real differences · 5 level
OpeningTree versus Chess Openings Trainer: the parameters behind the verdict, then further details
ParameterOpeningTreeChess Openings Trainer
Price$0.99Free — better
Rating4.4 (31 ratings) — better3.9 (17 ratings)
Positive reviews83.3% of reviews — better57.1% of reviews
Number of ratings31 — better17
Update frequencyEvery 2 months—
AdsNoNo
In-app purchasesNo — betterYes
MonetizationPaidFree with in-app purchases — better
Best chart rank#122 — better—
DevicesiPhone, iPad, iPodiPhone, iPad, iPod
Requires iOS15.615.0 — better
Further details — not scored
Size52 MB22 MB
Age rating4+4+
DeveloperMichael AdamsPiero Toffanin

Customer experience

OpeningTree

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

Chess Openings Trainer

All ratings17 ratings
Positive70.6%
Neutral5.9%
Negative23.5%
Written reviews14 reviews
Positive57.1%
Neutral14.3%
Negative28.6%

In-app purchases

None

OpeningTree

No in-app purchases

1 purchases

Chess Openings Trainer

One-time1
  • Pro$6.99

Questions

Is OpeningTree free?
OpeningTree costs $0.99, with no in-app purchases.
Is Chess Openings Trainer free?
Chess Openings Trainer is free to download, with in-app purchases available.
Which has better reviews, OpeningTree or Chess Openings Trainer?
OpeningTree is rated higher. OpeningTree averages 4.4 out of 5 from 31 ratings, while Chess Openings Trainer averages 3.9 from 17 ratings.
Do OpeningTree or Chess Openings Trainer have ads?
Neither OpeningTree nor Chess Openings Trainer shows ads.

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