Android game
Chess Puzzles
A fully offline collection of mate-in-1 to mate-in-4 puzzles on a wooden board. Every puzzle is proven by a built-in solver to have exactly one winning first move — no guesswork, no broken puzzles.
The game
Each puzzle shows a position and a task, such as "White to move. Mate in 3." Tap a piece, tap where it should go, and watch it walk across the board square by square. The opponent always answers with the toughest defense — and after a wrong move, with the refutation.
Hand-made mate puzzles are often wrong: an impossible position, a second solution, or no forced mate at all. That's why every puzzle in Chess Puzzles is proven by an exact mate solver: the shortest forced mate is exactly the number of moves in the task, and only one first move works.
Everything in one place
♟️ 605 built-in puzzles
Mate in 1 to 4 in five levels: Beginner, Easy, Medium, Hard and Expert. Chosen for variety from about 105,000 proven candidates, and all checked again afterwards. Half of them you play with black.
🎯 Training
Filter by mate length, by theme (sacrifice, queen sacrifice, quiet move, zugzwang, discovered check, double check, underpromotion, smothered mate, back-rank mate…) and by middlegame or endgame.
✨ Fresh puzzles
Compose a fresh puzzle creates a new one on your device with the same generator and solver as the built-in collection. When you have solved every puzzle of a level, new ones are made automatically.
🪵 A wooden board
A rendered board of walnut and maple (or rosewood and boxwood) with side-view Staunton pieces in turned boxwood and ebony. Pieces walk, knights jump, and a captured piece fades away.
Highlights
- A green, orange or red status dot: can you still force mate in the moves you have left?
- Any other winning move than the main line is accepted too
- Unlimited undo and redo, Restart, two-step hints and Show solution
- Points, stars, a top 10 per level, your own puzzle rating and a streak
- About this puzzle: phase, pawn structure, material, number of lines and tempting wrong tries
- Adaptive layout: board and side panel side by side on tablets, foldables and in landscape
- Animation speed Slow, Normal or Fast; pause hides the board; Continue after closing the app
- Dark mode, vibration and keep-screen-on options
Download
Why Chess Puzzles isn't on the Google Play Store
Google currently enforces highly demanding and complex requirements to publish new apps (such as mandatory closed testing phases with at least 20 people for 14 days, rigorous identity verification, and heavy administrative overhead). Because we build apps purely for our own enjoyment and want to keep it simple, we prefer to share the app with you directly.
How to Install the App
- Directly on your phone: Open the downloaded file. If prompted, allow your browser or file manager to "Install unknown apps" from outside the Google Play Store. Google started blocking this way of installing APK files.
- Via your computer: Connect your phone to your computer with a USB cable and install the app using Android Debug Bridge (ADB).
By downloading you agree to the Privacy Statement & Disclaimer. Use is entirely at your own risk.
How to install an APK directly on your phone
- Tap the download button above and wait for chesspuzzles.apk to finish downloading.
- Open the file (via your notification shade or the Files app).
- Android will ask permission to install unknown apps. Tap Settings and enable "Allow from this source" for your browser or file manager.
- Go back and tap Install.
- Open Chess Puzzles when installation completes.
Installing apps from outside the Play Store is a normal Android feature. You can turn the "unknown sources" permission back off afterwards if you prefer.
How to install an APK via your computer
The cleanest, safest, and most secure way to install an APK file—without modifying your phone's mobile security settings or enabling "Unknown Sources"—is via ADB (Android Debug Bridge) from your computer. This is an official command-line utility supplied by Google for Android developers.
Step 1: Download ADB on your computer (The fastest way)
You do not need to install the massive Android Studio suite. Google provides a lightweight, standalone package called Platform-Tools.
- Windows: Download the official Android SDK Platform-Tools for Windows.
- Mac / Linux: Download the zip package above or install it instantly via your terminal line:
- Mac (via Homebrew): Run
brew install android-platform-tools - Linux (Ubuntu/Debian): Run
sudo apt install adb
- Mac (via Homebrew): Run
Note: If you downloaded the ZIP file (Windows/Mac), extract it into an easy-to-reach directory, such as C:\platform-tools or your Desktop.
Step 2: Prepare your Android phone
- Open the Settings app on your phone.
- Go to About phone (or System > About).
- Tap Build number 7 times rapidly until a notification pop-up says: "You are now a developer!".
- Return to the main Settings menu, open the new Developer options panel, and turn on USB debugging.
Step 3: Install the APK file
- Connect your phone to your computer using a USB cable.
- Look at your phone's screen: a prompt will ask "Allow USB debugging?". Check the option for “Always allow from this computer” and tap Allow.
- Move your downloaded APK file directly into the folder where you extracted the platform-tools files.
- Open Command Prompt (CMD) on Windows or Terminal on Mac/Linux, and change directories to that folder (e.g., on Windows, type:
cd C:\platform-tools). - Run this command to verify your computer properly detects your device:
(If you see a serial number followed by the word 'device', you are connected successfully!)adb devices - Run the installation script command:
adb install chesspuzzles.apk
When the terminal returns a Success message, the app is fully installed on your device and ready to launch!
How to play
1. Pick a level
On the main menu, choose a level under Difficulty (or Any level) and tap New puzzle. The menu shows how many puzzles of each level you have solved. Continue puzzle picks up where you left off; Training filters by theme, mate length and position type.
2. Make your moves
Tap a piece: its legal squares get dots. Tap the destination and the piece walks there. The opponent replies automatically. Keep going until it's mate.
3. Watch the status dot
The dot at the top left tells you whether you're still on the right track. Tap it for details.
| Dot | Meaning |
|---|---|
| 🟢 Green | You can still force mate within your remaining moves, whatever the opponent does. |
| 🟠 Orange | No certainty within 5 seconds (didn't happen in testing). |
| 🔴 Red | Proven: no forced mate any more. Use Undo. |
A move that turns the dot from green to red counts as a mistake.
4. Hints and solution
💡 Hint works in two steps: first it shows which piece to move, then a green arrow with the move. 👁 Solution shows the whole line — but counts as a loss for your rating and ends your streak.
Difficulty levels & scoring
Every puzzle gets a rating from four things: the number of moves to mate, the complexity of the idea (a quiet move, a sacrifice, zugzwang, an underpromotion…), the number of variations and tempting wrong moves, and whether you are behind in material.
| Level | Rating | Typical | Puzzles |
|---|---|---|---|
| Beginner | below 800 | Mate in 1 with a clear idea | 110 |
| Easy | 800–1199 | Mostly mate in 2 with forcing moves | 130 |
| Medium | 1200–1599 | Hard mate in 2 or mate in 3; first sacrifices and quiet moves | 130 |
| Hard | 1600–1999 | Mate in 3 or 4 with misleading options | 125 |
| Expert | 2000+ | Long, quiet or sacrificial lines with many branches | 110 |
| What | Points |
|---|---|
| Base | Puzzle rating ÷ 5 (mate in 1 ≈ 120, a hard mate in 4 ≈ 450) |
| Hint (per step) | −20% of the base |
| Mistake (green → red) | −30% of the base |
| Fast and without hints | up to +50% |
| Streak | +5% per puzzle solved in a row (up to +50%) |
Stars, rating and high scores
- Stars: ★★★ without hints or mistakes, ★★ with one, ★ with more.
- Your puzzle rating starts at 1000 and moves up or down like a chess rating, against the rating of each puzzle: solved without help is a win, with help a draw, and viewing the solution a loss.
- Menu → Scores keeps a top 10 for each level.
Tips
- Checks, captures, threats — but don't stop there. From Medium on, the key move is often a quiet move that doesn't give check at all.
- Count the defender's replies. In a mate in 3, your second move has to work against every defense.
- Read "About this puzzle". The number of lines to find and tempting wrong tries tells you how tricky it is.
Permissions this app requests
Privacy & cost — in plain terms
- No usage data collected. No analytics, crash reporting or advertising SDKs, and no Google Play services or Firebase.
- No personal data requested. There are no accounts, no sign-up, no login.
- No cookies. The app is not a web app and stores no cookies; this website sets none either.
- No internet connection. The game works fully offline; the board and pieces were rendered for this app, not downloaded.
- Nothing runs in the background. Clock, solver and puzzle generator stop as soon as you leave the app.
- No payment, ever. The game is completely free, with no ads and no in-app purchases.
Your settings, progress, high scores and current puzzle are stored only in a private file on your device. Cloud backup and device transfer are disabled. For the full statement, see Privacy & Disclaimer.
Provided as is
Chess Puzzles is a hobby project, shared for learning and fun. It is provided "as is", without any warranty. Please read the full Privacy Statement & Disclaimer before use — by installing or using the app you accept those terms.
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