OpeningTree vs The Chess Clock App
Price, ratings, monetisation and update history for both games, side by side — with what reviewers say about each.
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.
- 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
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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.
The Chess Clock App
This app provides a customizable timer for various board games, including chess and shogi. It supports multiple time control modes like Sudden Death, Fischer, Byoyomi, and Handicap, allowing for individual player settings. Ideal for 2-4 player matches.
- Multiple time control modes
- Fischer Mode support
- Byoyomi Mode support
- Sudden Death Mode support
- Handicap time control
- Customizable per-player settings
- Supports 2-4 player games
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The Chess Clock is a simple yet powerful game timer app, designed not only for two-player matches like shogi and chess, but also for 3–4 player games and various board game scenarios. Supported time control modes: - Sudden Death A classic format where the game ends when a player's time runs out. Each player’s initial time can be customized individually. - Fischer Mode A format where a fixed amount of time (e.g., +10 seconds) is added after each move. Both initial time and increment time can be set per player. - Byoyomi Mode After a player's main time runs out, each move must be played within a fixed number of seconds (e.g., 30 seconds). The byoyomi time and when it starts can be customized for each match. - Handicap Time Control Customize different time settings for each player to create a balanced or challenging match using any of the above formats. The app is perfect for serious chess and shogi matches, as well as for multiplayer board games with 3–4 players. With flexible per-player settings, it adapts to a wide range of game styles and situations. Terms of Use: https://www.apple.com/legal/internet-services/itunes/dev/stdeula/
Screenshots
Verdict
The clearest difference is review sentiment: OpeningTree at 83% against The Chess Clock App's 33%. OpeningTree also leads on in-app purchases (none vs 2) and ads (none vs shown). The Chess Clock App's advantage is price (Free vs $0.99) and rating (4.6 vs 4.4). On ratings volume, 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
The Chess Clock App is free to download; OpeningTree costs $0.99 up front. The Chess Clock App sells 2 in-app purchases, starting at $2.99 per month. OpeningTree asks for nothing beyond the download.
The Chess Clock App holds the better App Store score, 4.6 against 4.4. Both are backed by a comparable volume of ratings — 31 and 31 respectively. Written reviews complicate that: 83% of OpeningTree's written reviews are positive against 33% of The Chess Clock App's, so the app with the better star average is not the one people write more warmly about.
OpeningTree ships an update every 2 months, The Chess Clock App every 36 months. Both last shipped on October 24, 2026.
| Parameter | OpeningTree | The Chess Clock App |
|---|---|---|
| Price | $0.99 | Free — better |
| Rating | 4.4 (31 ratings) | 4.6 (31 ratings) — better |
| Positive reviews | 83.3% of reviews — better | 33.3% of reviews |
| Number of ratings | 31 | 31 |
| Update frequency | Every 2 months — better | Every 36 months |
| Ads | No — better | Yes |
| In-app purchases | No — better | Yes |
| Monetization | Paid | Free with in-app purchases — better |
| Devices | iPhone, iPad, iPod | iPhone, iPad, iPod |
| Requires iOS | 15.6 | 15.6 |
| Further details — not scored | ||
| Size | 52 MB | 37 MB |
| Age rating | 4+ | 4+ |
| Developer | Michael Adams | Vida Apps Incorporated |
Customer experience
OpeningTree
The Chess Clock App
In-app purchases
OpeningTree
No in-app purchases
The Chess Clock App
- Premium Plan - 1 Month1 Month trial$2.991 Month
- Premium Plan - 1 Year1 Month trial$29.991 Year
Questions
Is OpeningTree free?
Is The Chess Clock App free?
Which has better reviews, OpeningTree or The Chess Clock App?
Do OpeningTree or The Chess Clock App have ads?
Which is updated more often, OpeningTree or The Chess Clock App?
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