Lichess Wiki

The Lichess covenant:

lichess.org will always be free.
lichess.org will never contain advertisements.
lichess.org will always be open source.

The purpose of Lichess is to provide a simple chess game interface. It requires no registration; you don't need to create an account to play. It requires no plugins (e.g. Flash or Java) and can be run from any modern web browser.

Features

Chess

Two-player games between humans
Single-player games (versus Stockfish, the most powerful open-source engine)
Threefold repetition draw recording (must be claimed by player)
Automatic draw detection by 50-move draw rule
Automatic draw detection of insufficient mate material
Spectator mode
Premoves
Support for moretime()
Castling, en passant, and pawn promotion and under-promotion
Detection of check, checkmate, and stalemate
Resignation and draw offers
Ability to abort uninitiated games or force resignation

Customisation

Time controls for chess clocks, including Fischer time settings
Optional White and Black player randomization
Option to request to take back a move
Support for the Chess960, also known as Fischer Random, chess variant
User-defined restriction of who can join games, based on player rating

Technology

Greatly standards-compliant design (CSS, HTML)
Works in any modern web browser (except Internet Explorer 8 and lesser versions), with no plugins such as Flash or Java needed
Availability in fifty-eight languages
Ability to change the overall theme of the website from black to white
Basic chess set theme switching
Ability to invite friends to a game via unique links created for every game
Optional username and password registration
Option for users to close their accounts

Analysis: the science of chess

Computer analysis and annotations upon request for player's review
Database export of any players' games as comma-separated values (CSV)
Per-game export in portable game notation
Bookmarking games for indexing and popularity
Complete list of checkmates in games played on Lichess
Global statistics and charts for ratings history and game ends
Player account statistics (e.g. rank, history, win to loss ratio) for rated games
Visual move validation while choosing destination squares
Game replay and analysis

Community

Active Lichess games monitor
Integrated chat
Spectator communication while watching a game
Public Lichess player searching and online members page
Tournaments
A custom forum package
Ability to form teams with other players
Individual forum boards for teams

More features are always being considered!

It means you may read, modify, use and redistribute the code. A copy of the license must be included in all copies of this software. You may not hold the author liable for any problems with this software.

View or download the source code using the Lichess repository on GitHub.

Lichess is built exclusively using open-source software, including:

Scala
JavaScript with jQuery 1.7.2
HTML5 with CSS
Arch Linux
nginx
Vim
Stockfish
pgn4web

Lichess works best with modern Internet browsers like Google Chrome, Mozilla Firefox, Opera or Safari.

Want to improve these pages? The Wiki is referenced from here.

lichess.org