Privacy policy

Written to be read rather than skipped: what leaves your browser, where it goes, and what you can do about it.

What play-chess.io collects about you

play-chess.io has no accounts, so there is no profile and no password held anywhere, and there is no advertising network on the site. Two things are collected, and both are described in full below: Google Analytics measures how the site is used, and a one-off feedback form asks for an email address partway through a game.

Standard web server logs record the usual technical fields — IP address, time, page requested, browser string — because a web server cannot serve a page without them. They are kept only as long as they are useful for spotting errors and abuse, then deleted, and they are never combined with anything else to build a profile.

What your browser stores locally

A game in progress lives in the memory of the browser tab and disappears when that tab closes. Nothing about your games is written to a database on the server, and no game history is retained after a session ends.

play-chess.io itself sets no cookies at all. It stores exactly one marker, pcio_feedback_v1, which records that the feedback form has already been shown so that it does not come back. The only cookies on the site belong to Google Analytics, and the cookie policy lists all of it in one table.

What happens to a game you play

Nothing about a game leaves your browser. The moves, the position and the result live in the memory of the tab and are gone the moment it closes. There is no game database, no archive and no record of who played what.

That holds for every mode on the site: the engine that answers your moves runs inside your own browser rather than on a server, which is also why a game keeps working when the connection drops.

Google Analytics and what it records

play-chess.io uses Google Analytics 4 with the measurement identifier G-QSNZBQFZD5. It runs on every page and records how the site is used: which pages were opened and in what order, roughly where the visitor is at country and city level, which browser and device were used, and how the visitor arrived — from a search engine, a link or directly.

Analytics does not see your chess games. Moves, positions and the result stay inside the browser tab and are never sent to Google. What it sees is that a page was opened and for how long.

Google Analytics 4 shortens IP addresses before storing them and does not keep the full address. An IP address is still personal data under the GDPR, and Google processes it on servers that may sit outside the EU. Analytics is used only to count visits and see which pages people read; it is not used to profile anyone or to target advertising, and no advertising features of Analytics are switched on.

To stop analytics running at all, use a browser that blocks trackers, an ad blocker, or Google’s official opt-out extension on the desktop. The game behaves exactly the same either way: nothing here depends on analytics being allowed.

The feedback form and your email address

Once per visitor, partway through a game, a form asks for a star rating and an email address. It appears a single time — a marker is stored in the browser so it does not come back, on this visit or later ones.

Submitting it sends three things: the email address you typed, the rating, and a short line of context recording how many moves had been played and in which mode. It goes to Formspark, a form-handling service, and from there to the site operator. Addresses collected this way are used to reply and to tell you about changes to the site; they are not sold, rented or passed to anyone else. Ask through the contact page and yours will be deleted.

Third parties that receive data when you open a page

Web fonts on play-chess.io are currently loaded from Google’s servers at fonts.googleapis.com and fonts.gstatic.com, and that request sends your IP address to Google in the United States. This happens on page load, before any consent could be requested.

Three third parties receive data from a visit, and there are no others: Google, for the web fonts above and for Analytics; Formspark, but only if you submit the feedback form; and the hosting provider, which sees the ordinary server request every website receives. There is no advertising network, no social media widget and no embedded video.

Your rights under the GDPR

If you are in the EU or UK you may ask what data is held about you, ask for it to be corrected or erased, object to processing, and complain to a supervisory authority. Requests go to the address on the contact page and are answered inside one month.

Because play-chess.io holds no account and keeps no games, a request about your personal data will return server log entries, whatever Google Analytics recorded for your visits, and your feedback submission if you sent one. Say which of the three you want — it makes the search faster.

Which law applies and who is responsible

play-chess.io is run as an independent project, and the person responsible for the data described here can be reached through the contact page; the full registered details are supplied on request. Processing follows the GDPR. Changes to this policy are dated at the foot of the page, and material ones are also noted on the about page.

Last reviewed 2026-07-23. Changes to this page are listed by date at the bottom of about play-chess.io.