5/20/2025 – During the Grenke Chess Open in Karlsruhe, nearly 3,000 players gathered to compete in either classical chess or the freestyle variant. It was an ideal opportunity to find out how accurately the participants could assess their own chess expertise. Arne Kaehler interviewed more than 50 players listed in the MegaDatabase, asking them to rate themselves in opening theory, playing style (aggressive or positional), and how often they reach endgames in their careers.
new: Fritz 20
Your personal chess trainer. Your toughest opponent. Your strongest ally. FRITZ 20 is more than just a chess engine – it is a training revolution for ambitious players and professionals. Whether you are taking your first steps into the world of serious chess training, or already playing at tournament level, FRITZ 20 will help you train more efficiently, intelligently and individually than ever before.
Winning starts with what you know The new version 18 offers completely new possibilities for chess training and analysis: playing style analysis, search for strategic themes, access to 6 billion Lichess games, player preparation by matching Lichess games, download Chess.com games with built-in API, built-in cloud engine and much more.
This video course provides a comprehensive and practical White repertoire in the Ruy Lopez! Through instructive model games and in-depth theoretical explanations, you will learn how to confidently handle both main lines and sidelines.
€49.90
The ChessBase 18 Style Report
One of the most popular new features in ChessBase 18 is clearly the Style Report! When preparing for an opponent, it’s no longer just about the opening moves — understanding how a player prefers to play can make a huge difference.
Does my opponent enjoy endgames? Not at all? Then trade everything off right away!
Is my opponent aggressive and takes lots of risks? Time to swap the queens!
Are they cautious, defensive, and positionally solid? Then maybe it's time for a tricky opening to throw them off balance!
Rate yourself from 1 (miserable) to 10 (brilliant)
In a series of short video clips, Arne Kaehler asked numerous chess players to rate themselves.
Their only point of reference? Their own Style Report.
The Style report of Robert Ris
The percentage scores were converted into single-digit ratings. In Robert Ris' case, his formidable opening knowledge of 83% translated to an 8.
If a player rated themselves within 2 points of their actual score, they were considered accurate.
So getting it right wasn’t all that easy — and yet, the majority of participants nailed it! Quite impressive, especially given that none of them knew how the numbers were calculated.
Still, some of the results might not have seemed entirely plausible — and there are several reasons for that:
Number of games: With only 100–200 games, the calculations can fluctuate significantly. It’s not uncommon to see results exceeding 100%. Only once a player has logged more than 200 games does a more natural curve begin to emerge. That’s entirely understandable from a statistical standpoint.
Timeframe of games: For simplicity, the Style Report used in the videos was based on the player’s earliest recorded game. So when a YouTube viewer commented on Lara Schulze’s results, they had a point.
I wouldn’t fully agree with Lara’s rating. In my view, her positional play has a very distinct and strong character — I would rate it a 9 or even 10. Her sense for positional chess is well above average, even among players with a similar rating. From the games she has explained on social media, I’ve personally learned a great deal about positional concepts — and I’ve already been able to apply some of that knowledge successfully in my own tournament games.
The Style Report shows 36% (which translates to a 4) for Schulze, while Lara rated herself at 70% (a 7)
The Style Report of Lara Schulze shows 36% for Positional Play
However, if we look at the Style Report based on games from 2023 to 2025, it turns out Lara was absolutely right with her self-rating of 7!
Lara Schulze’s Style Report from the past 2–3 years shows a clear improvement in her positional play!
As GM Dr. Karsten Müller often explains in his Four Player Types model, many players start their chess journey with a bold, attacking, and risk-oriented style — but over the years, they gradually develop a more profound understanding of positional play.
Playing styles in chess are an important and thus often discussed topic. GM Dr. Karsten Müller and GM Luis Engel take up a model by GM Lars Bo Hansen based on 4 player types - namely ‘activists’, ‘pragmatics’, ‘theoreticians’ and so-called ‘reflectors’.
The future of the Style Report
The Style Report is making waves, and more and more chess enthusiasts are beginning to see the value of this tool. One of them is Frederik Svane, who told me recently how deeply impressed he was.
Frederik Svane is a big fan of the Style Report
With Fritz 20, there’s a new feature that allows you to manually set your opponent’s playing style.
Your personal chess trainer. Your toughest opponent. Your strongest ally. FRITZ 20 is more than just a chess engine – it is a training revolution for ambitious players and professionals. Whether you are taking your first steps into the world of serious chess training, or already playing at tournament level, FRITZ 20 will help you train more efficiently, intelligently and individually than ever before.
If you already know from the Style Report how risky your next tournament opponent tends to play, you can run a few training games against Fritz 20 set to that style — a great way to prepare and gather valuable ideas to be ready on game day.
Arne KaehlerArne Kaehler, a creative mind who is passionate about board games in general, was born in Hamburg and learned to play chess at a young age. By teaching chess to youth teams and creating chess-related videos on YouTube, Arne was able to expand this passion and has even created an online course for anyone who wants to learn how to play chess. Arne writes for the English and German news sites, but focuses mainly on content for the ChessBase media channels.
4/20/2025 – Renowned US chess trainer and International Master John Watson had a close look at the recently released ChessBase 18 for a review in Chess Life. He concluded: "Casual online players will understandably not feel the need for such a powerful tool, but anyone serious about significantly improving their chess will almost certainly benefit from this program". The review first appeared in Chess Life 4/2025. Reprinted with kind permission.
4/7/2025 – ChessBase 18 offers many possibilities for organising databases so that they contain all the important information, while remaining clear and user-friendly. In this episode, learn how to use ChessBase features to improve your game.
For a long time the Scotch opening was considered harmless and rarely played. This changed in 1990 when Garry Kasparov successfully employed the Scotch opening in his World Championship match against Anatoly Karpov. But that was 25 years ago. Now, there is no need to panic if you want to play 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 and need a line against the Scotch. On this 60 Minutes renowned and successful coach Adrian Mikhalchishin gives simple practical tips how to neutralize and counter the Scotch.
Ruy Lopez Powerbase 2025 is a database and contains a total of 12092 games from Mega 2025 and the Correspondence Database 2024, of which 1276 are annotated.
In this 60 Minutes, Andrew Martin guides you through all the key ideas you need to know to play with confidence. Whether you’re looking to surprise your opponents, or simply want a straightforward weapon against e5, the Centre Attack has you covered.
Videos by Mihail Marin: Najdorf Variation with 6.f4 and Nico Zwirs: Italian ‘giucco pianissimo’. ‘Lucky bag’ with 45 analyses by Edouard, Ftacnik, Gupta, Pelletier and others. Update service with over 50,000 new games for your database!
This video course provides a comprehensive and practical White repertoire in the Ruy Lopez! Through instructive model games and in-depth theoretical explanations, you will learn how to confidently handle both main lines and sidelines.
€49.90
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