Gaming trends may come and go, but chess is here to stay. People have been playing since the 15th century, and electronic chess is almost as old as the computer itself. The App Store offers dozens of chess games that let you challenge real live players and virtual grandmasters alike. We looked at the top contenders to see which ones have the right moves and which are a few squares shy of a full board.

Chess With Friends

There's no single-player, friendless mode; you can only play by passing your device to a friend or by finding other players online. Once you set up a Chess With Friends account, anyone in Contacts is a potential opponent, or you can let the app pair you with a random Chess With Friends user. However, these players can't be saved as friends to challenge later.

Online games are asynchronous (just like playing by mail), but an icon tells you if the other player is looking at your game while you are, so you can play in real time as well.

Check out the full review of Chess With Friends.

Cyber Chess Ultimate Online Chess

Solo games offer five difficulty levels, and you can save multiple games to revisit later. The aggressive, predictable AI in easy levels makes good practice for beginners, but Cyber Chess lacks novice-friendly features like a display of legal moves and strategy hints.

There's no two-player pass-and-play mode, but you can challenge players logged in to freechess.org and text-chat with your rival as you play. However, an opponent's pieces often jump to new positions instead of gliding smoothly around the board. Because you can't skip back to review past moves, you must keep your eyes glued to the screen or lose track of those changes.

Check out the full review of Cyber Chess Ultimate Online Chess.

Chess Genius

Chess Genius lacks online play, but you can pass your device to a friend for two-player games. Its solo game offers thirteen difficulty levels and dozens of options for timed games, both in maximum game length and the speed the computer takes to move. Chess Genius is a tough opponent any way you play.

Accomplished players can export move notations as emails, set up custom positions, import PGN files (Portable Game Notation, a standard format for chess applications) from the web, and more.

Check out the full review of Chess Genius.

Chess Classics

Chess Classics has no online matches, but you can play the computer at skill levels from Monkey to Master (no, really), or play a friend by passing your device. Either way, the 3D board is too small, and its pieces are difficult to distinguish from one another. The 2D mode is an improvement, but its pieces are slightly blurry and the overhead view animates moves too quickly, making them difficult to follow. You can't even listen to your own music while you play.

Interesting, if flawed, extras like a puzzle mode and commentary on classic matches round out the package, but Chess Classics is no classic in our book.

Check out the full review of Chess Classics.

THE REST OF THE PLAYERS
We liked Caissa Chess for its great looking single player and pass-and-play modes, but not for its clunky email-only online games. Versus Chess also caught our eye with timed, online-only matches that require no sign-up. Those matches lack some important features, but the game's interface is easy to read and tap-friendly.

We were less impressed with Chess Club R3; it offers solo or online games using one of eight variant chess rules, but doesn't distinguish itself from the competition otherwise. Chess Online Expert includes only adequate solo and pass-and-play modes, and its online matches are poorly suited to mobile gaming; matches can go on forever, and there’s no option to limit a game’s duration before play. Chess Game gives limited features, and the rigid design of its email-only online matches also makes it one to avoid.

THE WINNER
With its awkward 3D board and lack of online play, Chess Classics was a stalemate. Chess Genius came closer, bringing a strong solo game and features for novices and seasoned players alike.

Despite missing features like chat and its lack of a solo game, no other chess game felt at home on a touchscreen like our favorite, Chess With Friends. Its asynchronous matches blend real-time and correspondence pacing, delivering great matches against live players no matter how much time you have to play.