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Editor: Dr Tim Harding |
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Editor: Dr Tim Harding |
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© Dr Tim Harding
Last modified:
14 January 2012
For a more complete set of general chess links, try Chessopolis or New In Chess which are linked below in the Literature and Miscellaneous section.
We are in the process of weeding out dead links again. Will readers please warn us of any sites they find no longer exist?
Please go to our new Chess History links page for other websites relating to chess history.
Note to webmasters who may consider requesting a link: We only link to sites about chess and board games. If you are a poker or other gambling site, don't bother asking. Links on this page are reviewed periodically and a link to any site may be removed if the content appears to be out of date or unsuitable for our readers, many of whom are quite young.
Our national CC websites page and Irish links are separate from the links below.
Once very popular, The Correspondence Chess Message Board (TCCMB) is still online but appears close to death through lack of support.
Correspondence Chess Servers |
Major CC Organisations |
Other email chess clubs |
Other CC websites |
Player websites |
Chess literature |
Chess openings |
Other Favourites |
Miscellaneous Sites |
If you think your site deserves to be linked here, email us with your details. Note that we often do not include site logos (which make the page bigger) and we generally only give links where a site is of high quality or of special interest to correspondence players.
Major Correspondence Chess Organisations
International Correspondence Chess Federation (ICCF)
Recognised by FIDE as the world governing body for correspondence chess: ICCF makes rules, awards titles and runs the most comprehensive and authoritative CC rating list. ICCF was founded in 1951 and the legal successor to previous international bodies ICCA and IFSB (pre-WW2 European body).
The ICCF European zone also has its own good website.
ICCF is a true federation of national organisations. It published a book about the first 50 years of its activities, ICCF Gold.
Normally you have to pay entry fees to enter ICCF events. There are now just two major email CC organisations: IECC and DESC (see below) while IECG is winding up its email activities and switching completely to server play.
International Email Chess Club (IECC) * NB: URL CHANGE *
IECC does not run championships or award bogus titles. It does have a wide range of other events including friendly matches. Its most controversial feature is its attempt to ban the use of computer analysis - so if you like to avoid computer opponents, you have a better chance with IECC. A major article on IECC appeared in Chess Mail 7/2002.
International Email Chess Group (IECG)
IECG began around 1994 and was reconstituted at the end of 1996. It was the larger of the two free organisations and organises a wide range of competitions, now running on the Lechenicher SchachServer (LSS): see below. IECG is rather controversial because it awards titles and runs an event which it calls an email "world championship".
IECG recently announced that it is winding up all its ongoing email events by the end of 2010 and will start no new email tournaments.
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These are not in any particular order but we have played on the first five.
The ICCF web server is very well established.
This is a fully-featured CC server where many serious correspondence chess tournaments have already been played. We strongly recommend email players to switch to this mode of play. Chess Mail sponsored the inaugural event with 91 players in 13 sections.
The above is not a complete list of servers where CC may be played; we may add to it later.
A Bulgarian site (in English), http://online-chess.eu/ Online-Chess EU, links to many free and subscription playing sites (both real-time and correspondence-style).
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Other email and postal chess clubs
Apart from the above and the national CC organisations (separate links page), there are a several clubs within the UK and USA that are separately run but affiliated to the national bodies.
| In the UK: | BCCA | BCCS | Natcor (NCCC) | Social CCA |
The British Correspondence Chess Association celebrated its centenary in 2006. It has a new website: link above.
The British Correspondence Chess Society (BCCS), no longer exists.
| In the USA: | APCT | CCLA | USCF |
Note that many of Alex Dunne's "Check is in the Mail" columns from Chess Life can be read on the USCF site - a valuable resource!
The ASPC site (club for American forces and veterans players) is still going strong after 50 years, but has moved to a new URL.
There are now very few email CC clubs:
Apparently, 'For Chess Lovers', LIAPE, Sinergia, SIR and Eclipse no longer exist. Webserver CC seems to be killing off these clubs.
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Apart from our own Chess Mail website, where you are now, there was one other important site that we used to visit regularly: correspondencechess.com, which was established by John Knudsen and is now under the direction of Grayling V. Hill. There seems to have been little going on there since 2008 although the site is still live.
The main sections of this site are:
plus the Canadian CCA and APCT sites, Chess Journalists of America site etc. Something new can be found here almost every day.
Note that the ICCF online games archive is hosted at the main ICCF website but there have been no new additions since mid-2009.
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Several individual CC players have their own websites.
In alphabetical order:
Uwe Bekemann (Germany)
German CC-GM Dr. Stephan Busemann
Viking Chess by Karsten Fyhn: interesting site about Scandinavian chess, written in English by a Dane.
Semyon Goubnitsky (Ukraine) - site partly in English; mostly Russian.
"Herbie" by Christof Herbrechtsmeier (Germany); interesting games (in German).
Jaap van der Kooij (The Netherlands)
(Beware: games he offers for download are in old ChessBase format, often contain duplicates and truncated games, and files usually require a lot of cleaning up.)
Ragnar Wikman (Finland) Chess page not updated since 2005.
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The principal non-CC links of interest to us are:
The Chess Cafe (home of The Kibitzer). Founded by Hanon W. Russell about 15 years ago. Proprietor: Mark Donlan.
Tim Harding's monthly Kibitzer column resides at The Chess Cafe, a very large online magazine website, which is particularly of value to people with an interest in chess history and curiosities, with many columns by other writers. There is also a bulletin board, weekly book reviews of a high standard and an online shop.
The Week In Chess (TWIC) Editor: Mark Crowther; hosted by London Chess Centre.
FIDE (World Chess Federation, governing body for OTB play). Ratings, rules and more.
Ken Whyld Association (The KWA is an international association of people interested in chess literature and chess history. Tim Harding gave a lecture at its 2005 annual meeting in Amsterdam in September 2005.)
Chess History Editor: Richard Forster. This site now includes Edward Winter's Chess Notes which has moved from The Chess Cafe.
Chess Archaeology Editor: Richard Pope. An older chess history site which recently sprang into new life, posting page images from many 19th century American chess columns.
ChessLab
A popular high-tech site, featuring a database of two million interactive games you can play through with the Chess Tutor java applet. Find games, download PGN, play through online, analyse online with their engine.
Chessopolis Important site with categorised links and other stuff.
Palamede was an important group of sites but it no longer seems to be functioning except as a loose network of French sites based at a new URL. The name comes from the first French chess magazine published in the 1830s and 1840s.
You can still find the brilliant program Palview4 which is used extensively to present games on our website).
Chess Variants used to be part of Palamede.
GM Alexander Baburin's daily Chess Today and website, GM Square.
Tim Krabbé's Chess Curiosities - a treasure trove of unusual chess facts and strange games.
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Books, magazines and publishers
McFarland Publishing
McFarland are indisputably the leading producers of quality chess history books. They published Tim Harding's history of British and Irish correspondence chess in 2011 and a new book from him is in the pipeline for 2012.
New In Chess
The world's top chess magazine: eight printed issues per year. Good site for links and now with an online database of 800,000 games.
British Chess Magazine
The world's oldest chess magazine (founded 1881).
Moravian Chess
Dr Vlastimil Fiala's reprint house for chess books and periodicals from the 19th and early 20th century. They also publish (at erratic intervals) the 'Quarterly for Chess History'.
Chess Informator
Yugoslav outfit with the must-have periodicals for the past 30 years but their ideas about how to make an electronic publication are not to everyone's taste.
Kingpin
Scurrilous, funny, sometimes serious, sometimes libellous. Only comes out about 3 times a year when editor Jon Manley is in the mood. A new issue is just out!
Europe Echecs The principal chess magazine in French.
Gambit Publications Books published by company run by GMs John Nunn and Murray Chandler and by FM Graham Burgess.
Pickard & Son Based in Dallas, Texas. Pioneers in chess e-books.
Everyman Chess Prolific British chess book publisher.
Alternative reviews are available at: Randy Bauer's Revealing Reviews.
Looking for rare chess books?
Here are four dealers you can contact:
Raimo Lindroos, T:MI Shakeril, Finland, Email: raimo.lindroos@pp.kolumbus.fi
(Also good for literature on oriental games)
Manfred Mädler, Dresden, Germany. Email: Schachhaus.Maedler@t-online.de
(A long-established German dealer and CC master)
Schachbücher Urs Frischherz, Switzerland, Email: urs.frischherz@bluewin.ch
(Good site for bibliographical information on chess books)
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Commercial, Software & Miscellaneous
Some other sites we consider worth visiting from time to time:
Australian Chess Enterprises (agent for Chess Mail products Down Under)
Wholesale Chess - Buy chess sets, clocks, boards, pieces, books, and other chess equipment.
Useful Chess - play or learn
Chess Maze International (UK retailers)
DirectoryGame.com - an online directory of game sites
Regency Chess Company (Bath): a new chess shop in south-west England
A searchable online chess encyclopaedia: La Mecca.
For game collectors: Britbase is a site we highly recommend for good free downloads of archived British OTB events, plus many links to other sites where more games may be found. This is run by John Saunders who now edits BCM. It links to similar sites in other countries.
If you want to download games by ftp for your database, first get the index from the tremendous University of Pittsburgh pitt.edu site, which has zillions of games and chess software utilities to download in any format you might need. The gamefiles are not really recommended as they include a tremendous amount of incorrect data and garbage,
Excellent beginners' information is also available on the site of former North American CC Champion Jon Edwards who is active as a teacher of chess to children.
Bruno Berenguer's Chess Problem of the Day has a new URL.
Internet Chess Club (commercial).
Doctor Unclear's Homepage: exposing cheating on chess servers!
World Chess Network. Ambitious online play site. Pay to join for most features.Microsoft Internet Gaming Zone offers other games besides chess.
Bobby Fischer page by Chuck Ayoub
Software
Dr Robert Pawlak's site for his chess software reviews.
The best program for ICCF email play is probably Ectool by Andres Valverde. Not free, but cheap and it supports both PGN and ICCF message formats.
ChessBase GmbH. The world's biggest chess software company hardly need any introduction, do they?
ChessBase USA US agent for ChessBase.
Chess Assistant Excellent rival Russian program with support in USA and UK.
For chess fonts, we use the Alpine Electronics series created by the late Steve Smith, the true professional choice for chess publishers but perhaps expensive for others. They are now available again for online purchase.
For advice about diagrams, fonts and chess publishing tips, try the page run by Eric Bentzen for Nørresundby Chess Club's En Passant pages (Denmark). Part of the highly recommended Palamede site (listed under Favourites)
Chess Puzzles: chess tutorial software and training simulators for beginners and tournament chess players.
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So you want to play some strange openings?
Diemer-Duhm Gambit: Jyrki Heikkinen
The Chess Kamikaze Page wild and woolly openings and gambits
Sokolsky Opening, 1 b4: Marek Trokenheim.
Alternative Orang-Utan opening site (editor Benoit St.-Jean).
Urusov Gambit and related lines (Michael Goeller). MUCH IMPROVED!
Winckelmann-Reimer Gambit site (David Flude).
Nimzowitsch Defence and Clarendon Court Opening (Marek Soszynski, Sutton Coldfield Chess Club site, England)
ChessPublishing.com
If you want to play proper openings and are willing to pay good money... English-run subscription venture, updated monthly and aimed primarily at the keen amateur and improving player. It's a sort of opening theory encyclopaedia/magazine divided into twelve sections edited by different experts (mostly GMs). You can subscribe to just the openings you want, or the lot. Updated monthly with PDF booklets and downloadable games.
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