How to Play Chess on Zoom (And a Better Alternative)

You want to play chess with someone who isn't in the same room. You both have Zoom. Surely this should be easy?

It is, mostly. Here's the full setup, the limitations to know about, and a less clunky alternative if you find yourself doing this regularly.

The basic Zoom + chess.com setup

This is the most common workaround. It works, but only one person controls the board.

Step 1: Start a Zoom call with your opponent. Standard meeting, video on, audio on.

Step 2: One of you opens chess.com (or Lichess) and creates a game. On chess.com, click "Play" → "Play a Friend" → set the time control and color → copy the challenge link.

Step 3: Send the link in the Zoom chat. Your opponent clicks it and joins the game in their own browser.

Step 4: Both share screens (or just the host). This is where it gets awkward. If only one person screen-shares, only they see the live board update — the other person sees their own browser. If you both screen-share, Zoom switches between views and it gets disorienting.

Step 5: Play. Each of you makes moves in your own chess.com window, and the platform syncs them. You watch the video on one half of your screen, the board on the other half.

That's the basic setup. It works for casual games.

What goes wrong

A few friction points that you'll hit immediately:

Window management. You're constantly resizing windows, hiding the Zoom toolbar, and trying to keep the board visible while not losing the video. On a laptop screen this gets cramped fast. On mobile, it's basically impossible.

Lag mismatch. The Zoom video is on one connection, the chess.com sync is on another. They drift. Sometimes you see your opponent react to a move before the move appears on your board.

Screen-share confusion. "Wait, are you seeing the same board I am?" comes up roughly every other game.

Camera quality. Zoom's video compression makes it hard to read your opponent's expression — which is half the reason you wanted video chess in the first place.

No board interaction across the share. If you screen-share your chess.com, your opponent can see it but can't click on it. Pieces have to move in their own window or yours, never both.

Time controls get weird. Latency between Zoom and chess.com means clocks can feel slightly off, especially in bullet.

How to make Zoom chess less painful

If you're going to do this, a few tips:

Use two monitors if you have them. One for video, one for the board. Solves 80% of the window-juggling.

Have only one person screen-share — the better camera angle. It cuts the visual chaos in half.

Use Lichess instead of chess.com for the board. Lichess has a cleaner UI, no popups, and the link-to-play flow is faster.

Turn off your own video preview. That little "self view" rectangle is constantly distracting. Zoom lets you hide it.

Use rapid or longer time controls. Bullet on Zoom is a recipe for frustration. Stick to 10+0 or longer.

A better alternative

The reason we built ChessChat is that the Zoom + chess.com workflow is, frankly, a workaround that nobody loves. We wanted one tool that does both jobs in one window.

ChessChat puts the synced board and the video in a single interface. Both players can move pieces. The video is sized so you can read your opponent's face. The board updates instantly because it's not bouncing between two services.

You don't need to download anything (it's web-based), you don't need a paid Zoom account, and there's no time limit on calls.

Try ChessChat →

Quick comparison

When Zoom is still the right choice

To be fair: if you're already on a Zoom call for some other reason and someone says "let's play a quick game," firing up chess.com on screen-share is the fastest path to a board. You don't need to convince anyone to switch tools. We get it.

But if you're playing chess with the same person regularly, the ten-second migration to a dedicated tool will save you hours of friction over the next year.

Try ChessChat →