Airplane Chess

Airplane Chess is chess for the places a network doesn't reach — a plane, a bus, a tunnel, a car on a long road.

Nothing it does needs a server. There are no accounts to make, no ads, no tracking, and no connection to drop halfway through a game.

THREE WAYS TO PLAY

• Against the computer, at three levels. It thinks at a human pace rather than answering the instant you move.

• Pass and play, one phone between two people, the board turning to face whoever is to move.

• Two phones side by side, with no network of any kind — over Bluetooth, and between iPhones over Apple's peer-to-peer Wi-Fi as well. Paired players get a lobby: play a game, or just talk.

THE WHOLE GAME, PROPERLY

Castling, en passant and promotion. Stalemate, insufficient material, threefold repetition and the fifty-move rule — every way a game of chess can end, including the ones most apps quietly skip.

Take a move back, resign, or offer a draw. A game you walk away from is still there when you come back, even if the phone restarted in between.

Finished games are kept. Step through any of them a move at a time, or send one out as PGN — the format lichess and chess.com both read.

IN TEN LANGUAGES

Catalan, Dutch, English, French, German, Hungarian, Italian, Polish, Brazilian Portuguese and Spanish, following your phone unless you tell it otherwise. There is a short guide to the app and to the rules of chess in every one of them.

NOTHING TO SET UP

No sign-in and no account. A one-minute tour of the board the first time you open it, offered rather than forced, and skippable in one tap. Playing a phone nearby asks for Bluetooth the first time and nothing else — never your location.