I’m trying to work out whether the ChessUp is the right board for me, and I’m hoping the community can help fill in a few gaps. I’m particularly interested in unsupported software (e.g. Chessconnect), existing workarounds, or anything that’s on the roadmap.
Must-haves / biggest questions
Play through variations on the board and capture them in the PGN (not just the main line).
Review the game I’ve just played directly on the board (e.g. replay moves with highlighted squares).
Import PGNs (this may also solve the review use case).
How capable is the Board Editor? Can I comfortably set up arbitrary positions from a book or magazine, then continue analysing from there? Google AI suggested that ChessUp doesn’t have true piece recognition and instead infers moves from square-to-square movement, meaning arbitrary position setup may be limited. That didn’t sound right to me based on the website info, but would be good to confirm.
Nice-to-haves
Lichess Studies
ChessKid
Chessiverse
Chessable
The biggest attraction of the ChessUp for me is being able to play with minimal device interaction. My concern is that, in practice, I’ll still be reaching for my phone after almost every game—for example to review games with my 8-year-old, or when studying from books where I want to explore and save variations.
I’ve accepted that lessons will still require a device, although if there’s built-in audio that lets me keep the tablet/phone out of reach, that would be great to know.
Have I missed any existing features or workarounds that address these workflows?
It actually has the best piece ID in the business.
ChessUp 2 reads every single piece with full piece recognition. It also knows if you are touching a piece. So you can slide pieces. You can also hesitate and adjust your move without release. Only ChessUp can do this. All other boards misrecognize the moves.
FYI - The reason that Ai summaries spit out the wrong answer is that chessnut puts out false blogs for Ai to read. And Ai’s fall for it.
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For your other questions:
Play through variations on the board and capture them in the PGN (not just the main line).
We currently do not have line variation PGN generation.
Review the game I’ve just played directly on the board (e.g. replay moves with highlighted squares).
This is coming - but not on the board yet. We do have full review for free in the app - and any chess.com or lichess games are also on their respective platforms for review.
Import PGNs (this may also solve the review use case).
The app can ingest a PGN for review.
How capable is the Board Editor? Can I comfortably set up arbitrary positions from a book or magazine, then continue analysing from there?
Yes it can do that. The Ai summary on this subject is wrong.
Lichess Studies
Through 3rd party stuff (Chessconnect)
ChessKid
Not directly on board
Chessiverse
Currently through Chessconnect but launching as an exclusive built in feature soon.
Chessable
We have talked about bringing in move trainer with the chessable team - but no solution quite yet. Will be several months if we go ahead.
The biggest attraction of the ChessUp for me is being able to play with minimal device interaction. My concern is that, in practice, I’ll still be reaching for my phone after almost every game—for example to review games with my 8-year-old, or when studying from books where I want to explore and save variations.
I’ve accepted that lessons will still require a device, although if there’s built-in audio that lets me keep the tablet/phone out of reach, that would be great to know.
For our lessons - the audio comes from the phone through our app.
The great thing is all of this is free to check out. You can download our app and play with the pgn import, the lessons, etc.
Please let us know if you have any other questions.