Meet The New Mittens (And Future Chess Superstars)
The age of Mittens is over. The time of Mighty Martin has come∗. June brings new bots, some great new features on the Chess.com app (for iOS and Android users alike), and a host of incredible chess content and events that will keep you busy for the month!
∗ Okay, maybe Martin isn't that much better than before, but please go easy on him. He bought a cape and everything.
Here's what this monthly update covers:
Product & Engineering
The biggest changes last month were app-based, with greater accessibility for iOS users and an improved puzzle experience for Android users.
- The Chesstice League have just made their superhero landing on Chess.com. Unleash your inner evil genius by challenging the new arrivals, and... wait, what's Danny doing there?
- Puzzles on the Android app just got better. Enjoy solving puzzles with your friends as you progress through a collection of stages and unlock new ways to score!
- In other puzzle-related news, we added 26,387 puzzles to our collection in May, leading to a new total of 658,614 unique chess puzzles.
- We've added screen reader support to our iOS app to improve accessibility. Users with voice-over enabled on their iOS device can now play online and against bots. To understand the impact of this change, check out the video below:
With our new accessibility support for iOS world class tenor @AndreaBocelli can play chess by himself again! pic.twitter.com/CvYlCQiI5C
— Chess.com (@chesscom) May 24, 2023
If you are an engineer and want to help grow the game of chess, come work with us! Visit Chess.com/jobs to find out more.
Events
It feels like the same thing rings true every month: it's a great time to be a chess fan. Catch up on some of the amazing events that happened last month, and see what's ahead.
- GM Nodirbek Abdusattorov continues to make his mark on the world of competitive chess, with a victory over GM Fabiano Caruana in the ChessKid Cup.
- The Gotham Knights overcame the Shanghai Tigers with a dominating score of 9.5-6.5 to emerge as the champions of the 2023 Pro Chess League.
- GM Jose Martinez won his second Bullet Brawl crown, while IM Karina Ambartsumova took the women's prize in the event.
- The online portion of the Olympic Esports Series has concluded after a total of 42,000 people participated in open qualifiers. The eight finalists will compete during Olympic Esports Week in Singapore, joined by two wildcard entrants.
- The 2023 Junior Speed Chess Championship kicks off on June 13. Watch eight of the world’s brightest young talents compete at lightning speed on Twitch or ChessTV.
- B-Cup 2 has been announced. This massive in-person chess community and streamer event will take place at ESpot Paris on June 17, directly across from the Louvre Museum. Special guests include GM Alexandra Kosteniuk and Sardoche.
Community
There have been plenty of community-based competitions lately, giving you a chance at winning prizes like free memberships, one-on-one coaching sessions with titled players, and more.
- The PCL Prediction Contest results are in. A big congratulations to @Fazer180 for winning the competition with some truly seer-like prediction skills!
- Community Bullet Brawl has arrived. Happening at the exact same time as the titled version, this monthly event lets you compete against other community members using a 1+0 time control.
- You still have a chance to join the JSCC Bracket Contest! Win fabulous prizes by submitting your best prediction on who will beat who in the 2023 Junior Speed Chess Championship.
- If you can't make it to Paris for the B-Cup 2 event, there's still a way to take part: there will be an open bullet arena for international players at 6:30 a.m. PT/15:30 CEST with a 500€ prize pool. Read the B-Cup 2 announcement article for more details.
- We've launched the Official Chess.com Community club, giving you access to special events, competitions, updates, and more. Join us there!
- Lastly, we want to express our huge gratitude to everyone who joined the Chess.com & Lide Haiti fundraising event devoted to empowering girls in Haiti. Together, we raised $42,794.
Content
From tier lists to top-tier moves, check out some of the best chess content from the last month.
- What's the best way to respond to the two most common ways to start a chess game? Here are two comprehensive tier lists for Black's opening moves against e4 and d4.
- He's known as the internet's chess teacher, and for good reason. We had the chance to speak with IM Levy Rozman, also known as GothamChess, about what life is like as one of the most famous faces in the chess world.
- There's a good chance you've played a smothered mate before, but how about an en passant checkmate? Don't miss this article on ten chess moves to play before you die.
Chessable
Chessable has just had a huge revamp, meaning that you have more ways than ever to study and improve your game. Here's what's new.
- Announcing Chessable 3.0: Chessable has just had some huge improvements to make your learning experience even more intuitive, personalized, and efficient.
- Part of Chessable's beauty is the chance to learn directly from some of the world's best players. Over 30 years of attacking brilliance by GM Vladimir Kramnik has been packed into this course for serious chess improvers.
- For those of us aspiring to less lofty heights (99.99% of the human population), there are some amazing free courses: Short & Sweet: 1. d4 d5 for Beginners by IM Andras Toth is a great way to make players of all levels feel more comfortable facing this common opening move.
ChessKid
The world's future grandmasters are honing their skills on ChessKid right now. Talented young players are going head-to-head on a regular basis, and some amazing things are being done in terms of bringing chess to a new generation.
Also, this drawing of GM Fabiano Caruana:
- ChessKid recently had a tie-in competition with the ChessKid Cup. Young fans from the chess community drew their favorite players with some spectacular results.
- The 2023 ChessKid Youth Speed Chess Championship starts soon. Players include FM Fausti Oro (the youngest ever player to reach 2300 FIDE), NM Patrick Liu, and other prodigies.
- Bolivia is a chess nation on the rise. A recent agreement between ChessKid and the Bolivian Ministry of Education means 110,000 children and 17,000 teachers are now ChessKid users!
- Want to challenge some of the world's top young players to a match? You can play against IM Shreyas Royal every Monday on ChessKid.
Fair Play
On top of making sure fair play standards are enforced across Chess.com, the FP team also lent their expertise to make sure the Champions Chess Tour and Junior Speed Chess Championship were contested in a fair and equal playing environment.
Fair Play stats for May:
- 115,875 Fair Play closures (including 14 titled players)
- 176,000 mute actions
- 156,000 accounts muted
- 145,000 abuse closures
Support
The Chess.com Support Team is always working to resolve your issues as quickly and effectively as possible. Here are the stats for May:
- Average Time to First Response: 2 days, 14 hours
- Total Requests Received: 113,509
- Average Quality by Member Rating: 93%
- Total Ratings: 8,478
As always, thank you for making Chess.com such an amazing place, and thank you for the comments you leave on these updates. Stay tuned—your thoughts might be featured in one of these updates soon...
