Buying guide for best electronic chessboard
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In a world where drones drop packages from the sky and driverless cars pick you up from the airport, you might think the elite world of chess would be a lonely bastion of analog strategy. Surprise: It’s not. AI, the Internet and robotics are all key features in the best electronics chessboards.
The game of chess and its community of players, students and chessmasters have long interacted with computers and technology. It’s possible to say that chess has been as influential in what we now call artificial intelligence as any other factor. An electronic chessboard offers advanced technology in a set that’s more tactile and more pleasurable than any screen-based app.
There are a number of excellent electronic chessboards available on the market. They vary in capabilities, but all offer challenging, instructive gameplay at levels from beginner to master. Our favorite is the Chessnut Evo AI Chess Computer, which features a challenging integrated AI engine and more than 100 levels to master.
Editors’ picks
Chessnut Evo AI Chess Computer
Editors’ Favorite
Board Size: 13.25” L x 21.17” W | Online Support: Chess.com, ChessKid, Lichess | Piece Recognition: Active | Piece Movement: Manual | Battery Life: 10 hr
For everyday gameplay, whether face to face, against an online opponent, or matched up against AI, we recommend the Chessnut Evo AI Chess Computer. This electronic chessboard offers challenging gameplay from beginner to grandmaster levels, and it comes with some seriously impressive AI engines.
The Evo’s Maia AI provides a built-in opponent with humanlike behavior, choosing a human move over a more “perfect” or logical one, and can play at levels from ELO 600 to 3159. The Stockfish engine is also included for a more analytical experience. It can also connect to Chess.com, Lichess and ChessKid for remote opponents, or simply analyze and and offer hints on a game played face-to-face.
The Chessnut Evo features a sleek, modernist chessboard measuring 21 inches by 13.25 inches, including a 12.3-inch touch screen that displays board status, strategy and move analysis. It features plastic pieces with the king measuring 2.64 inches in height.
Suggested moves and check status display as colored LED lighting bordering the relevant squares. Offering a 10-hour battery life, it runs on Android and connects to the Internet for remote gameplay and software updates.
SenseRobot Lite AI Robotic Chessboard
Great Value
Board Size: 18” L x 18” W | Online Support: Not available | Piece Recognition: Optical | Piece Movement: Robotic | Power: USB
The smaller, simpler and some might say cuter sibling to the SenseRobot AI, the SenseRobot AI Lite is an appealing robotic chessboard that also plays international checkers or, as some call it, draughts. While it lacks full-sized chess pieces, it provides plenty of challenge for young learners and an opponent that can grow with them as their skills develop.
The SenseRobot Lite is a robotic chessboard with a robotic arm as an opponent. The robot has a kid-friendly, disarming design with “ears” (or antenna) housing the system’s move sensors, plus a display screen that acts like a “face.” It has a roughly 18-inch board with checker-style markers that also display chess piece symbols. The SenseRobot Lite uses optical AI to recognize and manipulate the marker pieces with millimeter precision, but do so with a safe, light touch.
Geared toward children and beginners, the SenseRobot Lite offers audio coaching and simple introductory courses, but can advance as high as ELO 3200 over 25 chess and 10 checkers levels. In addition to chess, it supports 10x10 international checkers (draughts), with 8x8 American checkers support to come.
Chessnut Move Robotic Chessboard with Plastic Pieces
Best Self-Moving Chessboard
Board size: 25” L x 20” W | Online support: Chess.com, Lichess | Piece recognition: Active | Piece movement: Automated | Battery life: 8 hrs
The Chessnut Move is our top pick among electronic chessboards thanks to its seemingly magical self-moving pieces. Each individual piece can move on its own, obeying an opponent that could be on the other side of the planet, or in the AI of the board itself.
The Move features a board that fits tournament specifications, with pieces of either wood or plastic up to 4 inches in height for the king. Each piece has a motorized base, with transponders that update the board as to their location with up to 1-millimeter accuracy. With a command, the board can reset, causing the pieces to move back to their proper positions at the same time. Suggested moves show up as lights on the specific squares, and there’s error correction if you have a mishap with your pieces.
You can play with opponents via an app, Chess.com and Lichess, or against the built-in AI game engine, and even stream your games online. The pieces respond to your opponent’s moves in real time, giving you excellent visual and spatial awareness for your strategizing. It’s pricey, but it’s one of the slickest chessboards we’ve ever seen.
SenseRobot AI Chess Robot
Best for Beginner Players
Board size: 20” L x 15.94” W | Online support: Lichess | Piece recognition: Visual | Piece movement: Robotic | Power: USB
You may wonder if you really need an electronic chessboard with an actual semi-humanoid robotic arm attached to it. The answer, to many home chess enthusiasts, is yes. The SenseRobot AI Chess Robot offers the feel of facing an opponent with all the variety of an electronic chessboard.
The SenseRobot AI has a board measuring roughly 15 inches square with individual squares of less than 2 inches. Kings top out at just under 3 inches in height, so there’s plenty of tactile game experience to be had. The robotic arm looms over the board and surveys moves with AI-enhanced visual cameras, while a built-in screen shows game status and analysis. The arm itself has a strong but precise grip and can move pieces down to 1-millimeter accuracy.
The SenseRobot AI’s built-in opponent offers expertise from ELO 200 to 2900 world champion level, with a top super-difficult option of ELO 3200. It can replay classic games as well as endgame challenges, and the AI has a tutorial function as well. It connects to Lichess or via its app for remote play against a live opponent.
GoChess Mini
Travel-Friendly but not Self-Moving
Board size: 13” L x 13” W | Online support: Chess.com, Lichess | Piece recognition: Magnetic | Piece movement: Manual | Battery life: 10 to 100 hr
For electronic chess on the go, consider the GoChess Mini. This portable electronic chessboard’s pieces don’t move on their own, but otherwise you get all the interactivity, AI challenge and physical playability of larger electronic chessboards.
The GoChess Mini’s pieces are sleek and modern, with the king reaching 2.85 inches in height. Each square on the GoChess Mini’s board is 1.38 inches per side, so it’s not a miniscule board that’s hard to play. While the pieces themselves need to be picked up and moved, clear, color-coded lights on the board indicate where they should go. Battery life ranges from about 10 to over 100 hours, depending on LED and AI usage.
You can use the GoChess Mini to play against AI with up to 32 levels of difficulty, with the LED lighting teaching you about good moves if desired. You can also play against remote opponents on the GoChess app, Chess.com or Lichess.
How we analyzed
To compile this buying guide, our team dove into the market for electronic chessboards. We brushed up on our knowledge of chess, its terminology, popularity and community. We consulted various authorities, including well-known vendors and specialty chess retailers, for what to look for in electronic chessboards. We narrowed our list based on feature evaluation, buyer reviews and price, paying attention to which chessboards offered the most useful or innovative features for different needs.
Why you should get an electronic chessboard
If you already have a traditional chessboard or play chess on your computer or smart device, you may wonder why you’d want an electronic chessboard. The answer is, electronic chessboards combine traditional chessboards with the best features of computerized chess.
- Board awareness: Electronic chessboards, like traditional chessboards, are physical and tactile. This is not only pleasurable to play, but contributes what’s sometimes called board awareness — a learned instinct that comes with sizing up a chessboard and the location of chess pieces and seeing the moves both you and your opponent might make.
- Analysis: Like chess apps or computer chess, electronic chessboards allow you to record and analyze your games. You can output games to standardized PGN files for any chess app or computer to understand, and you can get analysis not just from the electronic chessboard but the online chess community if you want.
- Practice: To advance in the chess rankings is the goal of every serious chess player. An electronic chessboard lets you practice games against a challenging opponent whenever you want to. You can drill openings, strategems, gambits, and endgames as much as you want. Although it shouldn’t replace a chess instructor or tournament play, an electronic chessboard works on your schedule.
Features of electronic chessboards
Move recognition
An electronic chessboard needs to know what pieces you’ve moved and where. This move recognition allows it to record your game for storage and analysis, and to formulate an opposing move if you’re playing against it. Electronic chessboards use various ways to recognize moves, including:
- RFID: Radio-frequency chips or similar transponders let the board know where a piece is with high accuracy.
- Sensors: Magnets or pressure pads in the pieces, the board, or both that sense when a piece is lifted, moved or set down.
- Visual: A camera paired with AI or other intelligence to recognize and track pieces and moves.
Move automation
An electronic chessboard lets you play against a computer, AI or a remote live opponent. To do so, it needs to be able to move the opposing pieces against you. Electronic chessboards may automate piece movement in one of several ways.
- Manual/Guided: You move your opponent’s pieces under the guidance of the board, such as with lights or via an audible move, or according to a screen or display.
- Automated: The pieces move by themselves, usually guided by magnets or some other invisible mechanism.
- Robotic: A robotic arm picks up and moves the pieces.
Design and materials
Electronic chessboards come in several styles and finishes. The most impressive ones, meant for chess aficionados, students or ranked players, are sized to the official dimensions used by international chess authorities and federations.
- Board size: Available up to tournament-sized. The U.S. Chess Federation specifies a board made up of 2.25-inch squares, while the FIDE (Fédération Internationale des Échecs, International Chess Federation) specifies 5- to 6-centimeter squares. Smaller boards are more portable.
- Piece height: The king is the tallest chess piece and is a measure of piece size. King heights of 3.5 to 4 inches are common for tournament play. Smaller pieces are more portable but can be unsatisfying for adults to grasp. Conversely, tournament-sized pieces may be challenging for young learners.
- Materials: Electronic chessboards may be made of wood, synthetic wood or plastic. Wood or wood-style boards are popular for their classic, traditional chess aesthetic, while plastic and synthetic sets may be traditional or stylized.
Game engine and AI
Electronic chessboards have the ability to act as an opponent for their players. Chess computers were an early harbinger of artificial intelligence, and many electronic chessboards now use the term AI for their computers and game engines. Some things to look for in the chess AI department include:
- Elo rating: The rating system that determines a chess player’s skill level; the lowest Elo rating is 100, while the highest is 2400 or above.
- Adaptability: The computerized or AI opponent should be able to analyze a player’s moves and adapt to them without becoming overly predictable or repetitious.
- Games and moves archive: It’s helpful and educational for the electronic chessboard to be able to show classic full games, gambits, endgames and other moves.
- Tutorial: As a learning aide, an electronic chessboard should be able to offer possible moves to a player, to help hone strategic thinking and situational awareness.
Internet connection
One of the most common and useful features of electronic chessboards is the ability to connect to other players and chess communities on the Internet. The two most popular chess sites, Chess.com and Lichess, are frequently compatible with electronic chessboards. You can play against other players remotely, or against bots, or stream and upload your own games. Electronic chessboards often come with a smartphone app with one-on-one remote play as well. Look for electronic chessboards with Bluetooth and Wi-Fi connectivity.
Power and battery
Like other devices, electronic chessboards generally run on rechargeable batteries or plug into a power outlet.
FAQ
Q. How much do electronic chessboards cost?
A. Electronic chessboards are somewhat expensive. Portable chess computers with smaller pieces may cost between $70 and $170. Specific electronic chessboards start between $200 and $600, while top-level electronic chessboards cost $1,000 and up.
Q. Are the rules of chess different on an electronic chessboard?
A. No. The rules of chess are the same on an electronic chessboard, which allows them to be excellent training and practice aides. The boards often alert you to illegal moves, or make it impossible to move illegally.
Q. Is an electronic chessboard worth it?
A. Compared to the free chess app often found on computers and smart devices, an $800 electronic chessboard with self-moving pieces may seem an extravagance. For serious students of chess, however, and anyone who wants to develop and maintain their skills, an electronic chessboard brings convenience, challenge, and access to a seemingly endless choice of opponents.
Our expertise
Jmar Gambol has been a writer and product tester for BestReviews since 2021. He has covered topics ranging from travel, to tech, to cooking. He has been playing chess since the age of 9 and has beaten a computer opponent once.
