← Socratic ChessA coach you can argue with
Socratic Chess reviews your own games with a chess engine, lets you interrogate every move and test your own ideas, and it never makes things up.
Why it exists
An engine can tell you a move was a mistake. It can’t tell you why you played it, or what to look for next time. That’s what a good human coach does, and it’s rare, expensive, and hard to book on demand. Socratic Chess sits with your own games, asks what you were thinking, grades your actual ideas, and tells you the truth about them.
How it works
- Your own games. Bring over your chess.com games and the coach walks through them move by move, or answer a question at each turning point in a guided walkthrough.
- Test your own ideas. Ask about the specific move you were considering, not just the engine’s top pick, and get a straight answer.
- Checked, not guessed. Every evaluation, best move, and line comes from a real chess engine running on your actual position. Nothing is invented, and if something can’t be verified, it isn’t said.
Every answer is checked against the engine on your actual position. If it can’t be verified, it isn’t said.
What it won’t do
- No empty praise. A move that only holds the balance doesn't get called brilliant.
- No softened losses. A losing position is called a losing position.
- No upsell language, no locked insights.
- No puzzle grind or streaks to keep you coming back.
And a move only gets called a blunder if it actually put the result at risk. Labels exist to teach, not to punish.
Who it’s for
Improving players, roughly from complete beginner up to around club level. If eval bars leave you cold and general chatbots feel unreliable the moment chess comes up, this is built for you.
Bring over a game or read more on the blog.