The Online Chess market was valued at $152 M in 2021 and is expected to expand at a CAGR of roughly 13% during the forecast period, reaching $318 M by 2030. [1]

Web2 Chess Market

The lion share of this market belongs to the biggest player, the famous Chess.com website which is an internet chess server and social media platform with more than 100 million users and a revenue upwards of $70 M. Over the course of its existence the entity behind the chess.com website has acquired other chess related companies like the Play Magnus Group which itself is a conglomerate of online chess servers like Chess24 and tutoring and education like Chessable.

Another notable player is Lichess.org which is an open-source internet chess server run by a non-profit organization. Lichess.org emphasizes open-source development and offers powerful analysis tools, including Stockfish integration, game review, and opening databases. Lichess.org also has a substantial user base, with millions of players, and is known for its passionate and active community.

Other notable competitors in this market are:

• GameKnot
• Red Hot Pawn
• SparkChess
• Chessity.com
• Chess King Learn
• ChessBase

The ensemble of these companies provide the following services to the chess community:

• Web2 Chess game
• chess variants
• chess education and tutoring
• entertainment
• promoting the game

Web3 Chess Market

Since the introduction of Ethereum and its smart contract capabilities, many companies have taken the path of creating gaming ecosystems in a decentralized manner. Other blockchains also followed suit, either by using the evm principles with different parameters or introducing entirely new approaches for consensus and execution, claiming to render Ethereum obsolete. As such, companies went on to propose game ideas on other smart contract platforms, which in essence had more compatibility towards game’s logic and lower cost in terms of transaction fee.

It is worth noting that having more compatible characteristics and lower fees doesn’t necessarily mean the system is better. One has to look through the fog of hype to notice the reality that any solution for a design problem involves trade-offs, and as a result, the outcome of such rivalries can only be determined by the test of time.

One of the projects targeting the game of chess is Radix. which claims to be a decentralized smart contract platform for wide range of purposes from decentralized finance to gaming. However, its purposes are different from CH3SS in terms of a Web3 chess platform and it holds chess events using the Lichess chess server.

Another project in the arena of decentralized chess is Immortal Game, which claims to be the next generation chess platform with Play-and-Earn model. The project aspires to introduce new features and variation to the ancient game and its main differentiator is the utilization of NFTs for chess pieces.

Apart from these established companies and their blockchain based chess platforms, efforts are made to bring the game to the Ethereum network as well. Students at Technical University of Berlin have tried it and a medium article was published explaining their path and the lessons learned.

In terms of the mission and service, none of the aforementioned companies are considered a direct competitor to the CH3SS project, since we do not position ourselves to replace their service, rather, we plan to capture the potential growth of the market in the coming years by becoming the go-to platform in decentralized chess.

SWOT analysis

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