These Terms and Conditions ("Terms") govern your use of ChessAtlas (国象搭子Atlas), our mobile app for iOS and Android, and this website (together, the "Service"). The Service is provided by Shenzhen Caractiv Tech Company Limited ("Caractiv Tech", "we", "us"). These Terms include the End User License Agreement for the app (the "EULA") set out below. By downloading, installing or using the Service, you agree to these Terms. If you do not agree, do not use the Service.
Our Privacy Policy explains how we handle your personal data and forms part of these Terms.
Who can use ChessAtlas
You must be at least 13 years old to use the Service. If you are under the age of majority where you live, you may use the Service only with the involvement and consent of a parent or legal guardian, who agrees to these Terms on your behalf. The Service is not directed at children under 13.
End User License Agreement (EULA)
This section is the end user license agreement for the ChessAtlas app (the "Licensed Application"), however you obtained it. It includes the minimum terms that Apple requires for apps distributed through the App Store.
Acknowledgement
This EULA is concluded between you and Caractiv Tech only, and not with Apple Inc. ("Apple") or Google LLC ("Google"). Caractiv Tech, not Apple or Google, is solely responsible for the Licensed Application and its content.
Scope of licence
Caractiv Tech grants you a limited, personal, non-exclusive, non-transferable, revocable licence to download, install and use the Licensed Application for your own non-commercial use on devices that you own or control. If you obtained it from the App Store, you may use it on Apple-branded products that you own or control, as permitted by the Usage Rules set out in the Apple Media Services Terms and Conditions, and it may also be accessed and used by other accounts associated with you through Family Sharing or volume purchasing. If you obtained it from Google Play, your use is also subject to the Google Play Terms of Service.
You may not rent, lease, lend, sell, redistribute or sublicense the Licensed Application, or copy, modify, reverse engineer, decompile or disassemble it, or attempt to derive its source code, except to the extent the law or an applicable open-source licence expressly allows this. All rights not expressly granted to you are reserved by Caractiv Tech and its licensors.
Maintenance and support
Caractiv Tech is solely responsible for providing any maintenance and support for the Licensed Application, as described in these Terms or as required by law. Apple and Google have no obligation whatsoever to provide any maintenance or support services for the Licensed Application. For support, contact us at contactus@caractiv.com.
Warranty
Caractiv Tech is solely responsible for any product warranties, whether express or implied by law, to the extent not effectively disclaimed. If the Licensed Application fails to conform to any applicable warranty, you may notify Apple, and Apple will refund the purchase price (if any) of the Licensed Application to you. To the maximum extent permitted by law, Apple will have no other warranty obligation whatsoever with respect to the Licensed Application, and any other claims, losses, liabilities, damages, costs or expenses attributable to any failure to conform to any warranty will be Caractiv Tech's sole responsibility, to the extent not disclaimed in these Terms.
Product claims
Caractiv Tech, not Apple, is responsible for addressing any claims by you or any third party relating to the Licensed Application or your possession and use of it, including: (i) product liability claims; (ii) any claim that the Licensed Application fails to conform to any applicable legal or regulatory requirement; and (iii) claims arising under consumer protection, privacy or similar legislation. These Terms do not limit Caractiv Tech's liability to you beyond what is permitted by applicable law.
Intellectual property rights
If any third party claims that the Licensed Application or your possession and use of it infringes that third party's intellectual property rights, Caractiv Tech, not Apple, will be solely responsible for the investigation, defence, settlement and discharge of that claim.
Legal compliance
You represent and warrant that (i) you are not located in a country that is subject to a U.S. Government embargo or that has been designated by the U.S. Government as a "terrorist supporting" country; and (ii) you are not listed on any U.S. Government list of prohibited or restricted parties.
Developer name and contact
Questions, complaints or claims about the Licensed Application should be directed to:
- Developer: Shenzhen Caractiv Tech Company Limited, 5/F, Area A, Jiada R&D Building, No.5, Songpingshan road, Songpingshan, Xili, Nanshan, Shenzhen, Guangdong, China
- Email: contactus@caractiv.com
Third-party terms
You must comply with applicable third-party terms of agreement when using the Licensed Application, for example the terms of your mobile network or internet service provider.
Third-party beneficiary
Apple and Apple's subsidiaries are third-party beneficiaries of this EULA. Upon your acceptance of these Terms, Apple will have the right (and will be deemed to have accepted the right) to enforce this EULA against you as a third-party beneficiary.
Your account
You can use most of ChessAtlas as a guest, without signing in. You may also sign in with Apple, with Google or with a one-time code sent to your email address, so that your progress can be kept and synced between devices.
- Keep access to your sign-in method secure. You are responsible for activity that happens under your account.
- Choose a nickname that follows the fair-play rules below.
- You can delete your account at any time in the app (Me › Account & data › Delete account) or by emailing us. See how account deletion works.
ChessAtlas Pro (subscription)
ChessAtlas is free to download, and you can play, solve puzzles and learn the rules without paying. ChessAtlas Pro is an optional subscription. Its benefits are described in the app when you subscribe; currently it removes the daily limits on new puzzles, hints, questions to Atlas and post-game reviews, unlocks the full weakness profile and the analysis of up to 500 recent online games, and removes interstitial ads. Puzzle explanations stay free for everyone.
- Billing. Pro is sold through the Apple App Store or Google Play. Payment is charged to your Apple Account or Google Account when you confirm the purchase. Prices are shown in the app before you buy.
- Auto-renewal. Pro is offered with monthly and yearly options and renews automatically at the end of each period unless you cancel at least 24 hours before the period ends. Your account is charged for renewal within 24 hours before the end of the current period.
- Free trials. If a free trial is offered to you, its length is shown before you subscribe. Unless you cancel before the trial ends, the subscription starts and you are charged.
- Managing and cancelling. You can manage or cancel your subscription in your Apple Account or Google Play settings. Deleting the app or your ChessAtlas account does not cancel a subscription.
- Refunds. Refunds are handled by Apple or Google under their policies; we cannot issue refunds for purchases made through their stores. If a purchase is refunded, the related benefits or unspent coins are removed.
- Price changes. If the price of Pro changes, Apple or Google will notify you as required by their rules, and you can choose whether to continue.
Other purchases and virtual items
The app may offer one-time purchases, such as Remove Ads, coin packs, and theme or board packs, sold through the App Store or Google Play. Purchases are linked to your Apple or Google account and can be restored in the app.
Coins, XP, streaks, chests, streak freezes, league rewards and similar items ("virtual items") are a limited, personal licence to use features of the Service. Coins can be used for things like hints, streak freezes and some board styles; they never buy puzzle answers or rating points. Virtual items:
- have no cash value and cannot be exchanged for money or anything of value outside the app;
- cannot be sold, transferred or traded;
- may be adjusted, for example when we rebalance game rules or correct an error, and are lost if your account is deleted.
Except as required by law, purchases of virtual items are final.
Ads
The free version of ChessAtlas shows interstitial ads at a few natural break points and offers optional rewarded ads. There are no banner ads. Pro or the Remove Ads purchase removes interstitial ads. How our ad partners use data, and how to control it, is explained in our Privacy Policy.
Fair play and acceptable use
ChessAtlas includes a weekly league in which your nickname, avatar and XP are shown to the other players in your group (up to 30 players). To keep it fair and friendly, you agree not to:
- use an engine, another app or another person to play or solve puzzles for you in league activities, or use multiple accounts to gain an advantage;
- use a nickname that is offensive, hateful, sexual, impersonates someone (including ChessAtlas staff), or infringes another person's rights;
- automate, scrape, reverse engineer or interfere with the Service, its servers or its security, except where the law allows this despite this restriction;
- use the Service for any unlawful purpose, or to harm other people.
Players can report nicknames. We may rename or remove a nickname, reset league results, or suspend or terminate an account that breaks these rules.
Atlas and chess analysis
Atlas, the AI chess buddy in ChessAtlas, explains positions in plain words. Moves and evaluations come from the Stockfish chess engine, and weaknesses are identified by clear rules; Atlas puts those results into words, and explanations are checked before they are shown. Even so, engine evaluations depend on search depth, and AI-generated explanations can be incomplete or wrong.
The Service is for learning and entertainment. Analysis, training plans and explanations are not professional advice and come with no guarantee of results, such as a rating gain. Some AI features have daily limits and need an internet connection.
Your content
You keep ownership of the content you provide, such as questions you ask Atlas, text you write when explaining your thinking, feedback, your nickname and games you upload or import ("your content"). You grant us a worldwide, non-exclusive, royalty-free licence to host, store, process and display your content only as needed to operate, improve and secure the Service, as described in our Privacy Policy. Feedback and suggestions you send us may be used without any obligation to you.
You confirm that you have the right to upload or import the games and other content you provide.
Linked accounts and imported games
You can let ChessAtlas analyse your games from third-party chess sites by entering your username there (we never ask for your password), or by uploading PGN files. We then fetch your public game data from those sites. Those sites are run by third parties under their own terms, and we are not responsible for their availability or content. You can disconnect a source at any time, which deletes the games imported from it.
Third-party services and open-source software
- Apple, Google and our other service providers are not parties to these Terms, except as described in the EULA above.
- ChessAtlas uses the Stockfish chess engine, which is free software licensed under the GNU General Public License version 3. We use unmodified official builds of Stockfish; the licence text and how to obtain the source code are listed in the app under Me › About ChessAtlas › Open-source licenses.
- Many puzzles come from the Lichess open database, released under CC0. Fonts and other open-source components are listed in the same section of the app.
Downloading the Android APK
We may offer the Android app as an APK file for devices without Google Play. Download it only from the links on this website or our official release page. The APK is the same app, and these Terms apply to it. It is not updated through Google Play; the app tells you when a new version is available. We are not responsible for copies obtained from other sources or modified by anyone else.
Intellectual property
The Service, including the app, its design, the Atlas mark, artwork, text, lessons, puzzles we create and the ChessAtlas and 国象搭子Atlas names, is owned by Caractiv Tech or its licensors and protected by intellectual property laws. Apart from the licence in the EULA, these Terms do not give you any rights in it. Open-source components are licensed under their own licences, which take precedence for those components.
Changes, availability and termination
We keep improving ChessAtlas, so features, limits and content may change. We may suspend or discontinue all or part of the Service; if we discontinue a paid feature, we will treat existing subscribers fairly as required by law. Some features need an internet connection and may occasionally be unavailable.
You may stop using the Service and delete your account at any time. We may suspend or terminate your access if you seriously or repeatedly break these Terms, if required by law, or to protect other users or the Service. Sections that by their nature should survive termination, such as intellectual property, disclaimers and limitation of liability, will survive.
Disclaimers
To the extent permitted by law, the Service is provided "as is" and "as available", without warranties of any kind, express or implied, including merchantability, fitness for a particular purpose and non-infringement. We do not promise that the Service will be uninterrupted or error-free, or that analysis and explanations will always be accurate. Nothing in these Terms affects rights you have as a consumer that cannot be limited or excluded under the law that applies to you.
Limitation of liability
To the extent permitted by law, Caractiv Tech will not be liable for any indirect, incidental, special, consequential or punitive damages, or for loss of data, profits, goodwill or virtual items, arising from or related to your use of the Service. To the extent permitted by law, our total liability for all claims relating to the Service is limited to the greater of the amount you paid us for the Service in the 12 months before the claim arose, or USD 50. These limits do not apply to liability that cannot be limited by law, such as liability for death or personal injury caused by negligence, or for fraud.
Governing law and disputes
If you have a concern, please contact us first at contactus@caractiv.com; most issues can be resolved quickly that way. These Terms are governed by the laws of the place where Caractiv Tech is established, without regard to its conflict-of-law rules. If you are a consumer, you keep the protection of the mandatory laws of your country of residence and may bring a claim in the courts there.
Changes to these Terms
We may update these Terms from time to time. We will post the new version on this page with a new "Last updated" date and, for significant changes, let you know in the app or by email before they take effect. If you continue to use the Service after the changes take effect, you accept the updated Terms.
Contact us
- Developer: Shenzhen Caractiv Tech Company Limited, 5/F, Area A, Jiada R&D Building, No.5, Songpingshan road, Songpingshan, Xili, Nanshan, Shenzhen, Guangdong, China
- Email: contactus@caractiv.com