Lichess for Improvers: Free Studies, Practice and Puzzles

Lichess is free with no paid tier, and its Learn, Practice, Studies and puzzle tools cover beginner basics, core tactics, checkmates and some endgames. That makes it the baseline any paid course has to beat: a course is worth paying for only if it gives you something below that you will actually use, such as a sequenced curriculum, teaching from a named coach, or a deep opening file. This page describes what Lichess offers, as read on 8 November 2026, and where it stops.

Ratings on this site use the Chess.com rapid scale as the default, and bands are approximate; see the rating bands overview.

Is Lichess really free?

Yes, as far as its own pages say. Its FAQ describes a free server with "no registration, no ads, no plugin required", and its Patron page says no features are reserved for patrons because Lichess is "entirely free, forever, and for everyone"; patrons get only cosmetic "wings". Lichess says it is funded by donations and run by volunteers and a full-time developer, and its about page says it is open source. We did not read its cost breakdown, which links to a spreadsheet.

What each tool covers

What Practice contains

We counted 32 lessons on the Practice page. The checkmates section has seven: piece checkmates, four sets of checkmate patterns and the knight and bishop mate. Fundamental tactics has eight: the pin, skewer, fork, discovered attack, double check, overloaded pieces, zwischenzug and x-ray. Advanced tactics has ten: zugzwang, interference, the Greek gift, deflection, attraction, underpromotion, desperado, counter check, undermining and clearance. Pawn endgames has three: key squares, opposition and the seventh-rank rook pawn against the queen. Rook endgames has four, including the Lucena and Philidor positions. The page says to sign up to save progress.

How to train one weakness with Puzzle Themes

Puzzle Themes let you drill one motif instead of taking whatever comes next, and that is the closest thing Lichess has to a tactics course. The themes page showed the counts below on 8 November 2026. Counts change as puzzles are added.

The menu also lists a Puzzle Dashboard with "Improvement areas" and "Strengths", and "Player games" offers puzzles generated from your own games or another player's. Puzzle Streak, Storm and Racer are also listed; we did not read their rules. The same page says the puzzles are public domain and can be downloaded.

A habit worth copying comes from GM Noël Studer's Lichess guide: work out the solution first, write it down, and only then play the move, so a puzzle does not turn into trial and error. That is coaching opinion. Studer sells courses and is listed on ChessMood's homepage as a coach, and the same guide recommends a ChessMood course.

How to use Studies as a free study system

A Lichess Study is a notebook of chapters, and its real value for an improver is holding your own material, not browsing other people's. Studer's guide suggests starting with three studies: one for your games, one for White openings and one for Black openings.

This is one coach's suggestion and a matter of preference. Chessable and similar paid tools add automatic spaced repetition to this kind of drilling, while a study relies on you to come back to it.

How to review your own games for free

Reviewing your games is where Lichess costs nothing and a course cannot substitute, because no course has seen your games. A workable loop, based on conventional coaching advice:

1. Play a game with time to think, for example at a 15-minute or longer time control.
2. Before any engine, write down where you think the game turned and what you were considering.
3. Import the game and compare it with the analysis board. A 2020 guide from RagChess describes an option to request computer analysis on import and an opening explorer on the board; both are worth confirming on the current site.
4. Save the one position that taught you most into a study of your own.

To stop watching your rating while you play, the FAQ says Zen mode hides ratings; enable it in display preferences or press z during a game.

How to use it by rating

This is conventional coaching advice, not a measured result.

• Under about 1000: Learn, then the checkmates and fundamental tactics sections, then puzzles in short daily sets. See under 1000.
• About 1000 to 1499: Puzzles for volume, the rook endgame lessons, and analysing your own games for recurring mistakes.
• 1500 and up: Advanced tactics, pawn and rook endings, and studies on openings you play. Beyond this, a coach or a specialist course is more likely to add something, depending on your need.

One thing to know: new Lichess accounts start at 1500 with a wide uncertainty, and the rating is marked provisional with a "?" until it settles (FAQ). Lichess advises against comparing its ratings with other organisations', so a Lichess 1500 is not a Chess.com 1500.

What a paid course has to beat

Use this as a test when you read any sales page. If the right-hand column is all you would be buying, Lichess already covers it.

What Lichess does not do

Lichess is not a sequenced course with a named teacher. Studies are user-made, so a good one takes finding. Practice is deliberately small. If you want a coach's explanation, a curriculum with someone else's order, or an authoritative opening file for a specific line, those are where paid products compete, and you can judge them against this baseline using free versus paid chess training.

Reader opinion on the question is mixed. In a Lichess forum thread on whether to pay for a Chessable or Chess.com course, one poster advised checking reviews, using the 30-day refund and still checking databases and master games, and another said Lichess itself is better than either paid option. Those are opinions, not findings. Studer's guide goes further and says you can do 80% of your training on the site, which is one coach's estimate rather than a measurement.

Who should skip Lichess's free tools

Nobody needs to skip them, but you may outgrow their coverage:

• You want a coach's feedback on your play.
• You want an opening repertoire file by a named master and nothing user-made.
• You want one site that handles lessons and your study schedule, for which a paid platform may suit.

For the Chess.com side of that comparison, see Chess.com Premium versus Lichess. More free options are on the free resources hub, including free Chessable courses, free Udemy courses and YouTube channels. If you decide to buy something, how to choose a chess course helps.