Is Lucas Chess Worth it?

All, 

Some of you may have seen a free training software out there called Lucas Chess.  I have read from some that it is the absolute best program out there that does not require purchasing.   In using it I have seen that there is a significant number of things you can train on such as Knight movements, tactics, blindfold chess, analysis, ELO estimates, endgame training, mating patterns, opening training, and calculating power, etc. etc., however I have yet to find a solid tutorial on how to use the program.  Lucas Chess seems to be an expansive tool that could be of great use but it's slightly clunky and not intuitive.

........ My question to all of those that are familiar with it:  

    1) Have you found a suitable instruction/tutorial on how to use all it's features and

    2) Have you found the program to be successful in getting you to be a better player and which way might that be? 

Thanks everyone.  

I tried it - it's quite good for playing against computer opponents.

I was less enthusiastic about the numerous 'training' type options it has. None of them seemed particularly valuable to me and all of them were extremely clunky.

I still think the best combo for mid-lower class players like me to improve is to to a graded tactics trainer (like lichess.com or the one here where it spits tactics problems at you for your level) and then do an equal (or greater) amount of time on youtube videos for game reviews and strategic ideas. 

I swear, every time I watch GM Akobian videos on St. Louis chess youtube, I get better, and need to calculate MUCH less during blitz games, as you just get easier positions to play with clearer plans with good solid positional moves.

Tactics are always important, but I swear that I'm not lying that every time I drill nothing but tactics for like a few days, I come back to blitz and promptly lose 50-75 points immediately since I think I focus on time-consuming and unnecessary tactical complications, compared to the Akobian-style playing where I play simple no-calculation developing and solid moves. Of course, the tactics ability is still there, and still used, and probably shows up even more in a few weeks when it's absorbed, but there's no denying how important that positional stuff is.

Thanks for the responses! 

Has anyone ever used Scid before? 

SCID is a good, free database program. Sort of a free replacement for ChessBase. It is great for what it is, and that is accessing large amounts of historical games, and you can use it to save and analyze your own games. It's a very different kind of software than Lucas Chess, which a playing/training program. 

I use Lucas Chess is a really good program if you want to learn how to play chess. And came with a lot of free tactical chess problems to solve. Plus a strong chess engine you can play. I used to improve my opening. Also, support DGT Eboard that is A+ to me.

Alright, where to start...

Lucas chess is the greatest chess trainer of all time. You don't pay a cent, you get unlimited access to all sort of tactics, you get to customize the board, pieces, colors, and everything about it, it's super easy to use, it has a huge database filled to the brim with checkmate in 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, and 9, you don't need WiFi access, there is no limit on how much you can learn, there's an even bigger and free catalog of bots ranging from almost everywhere you can think of, has the original grandmaster bot ELO's, and young people can learn using their own opponents.

It's even better than chess.com. That app right there should be worth money. But it's not. Why? Because people there don't care about making money. They don't just provide you with the resources. They want you to learn, outsmart their own bots, win and become a champion. It's why I use it. 

I rate it a 100/10.

Also did I mention that it can analyze games with bots of all sorts of ELO's to see how they think? Use it for yourself and explore the features. You will not regret it.

Completely agree with theproexpertboy. LucasChess is absolutely amazing for improving in Chess. My favourite feature by far is the ability to generate trainings out of your own mistakes. You can download all your games from the website of your choice as a PGN database - then import it into a LucasChess database.

Select all relevant games and click on "mass analysis". Under the tab "wrong moves", makes sure you set an error threshold in centipawns (vs best move), check "Add to the training find best move" and pick a name. If you then navigate to Train/Find best move, you have your custom training, which is a collection of all the mistakes you made (and you now have to find the best moves instead). You can customise how close to the perfect move you have to be in centipawns in order to pass. 
It is like the Lichess feature "learn from your mistakes" but in aggregate over all your games. You can then choose to only repeat the positions you had issues with etc.

I have not seen anything more useful for learning from my mistakes.

Agree with 100/10.

For Lucas Chess manual go here: https://lucaschess.pythonanywhere.com/docs  and press documents. It's amazing software to improve your chess game.

Lucas chess has improved over the years thanks to the overall improvement of modern chess engines. The latest update of Lucas Chess comes with the new Stockfish 15 which has a powerful neural network system. One can also adjust the "intelligence" of Stockfish to come closer to one's own elo, thus avoiding the scenario where one constantly looses to Stockfish at it's most intelligent setting! (which is an elo in the 3000s!!). There is also a customizable  tactical trainer. The program has many different functions that all work towards showing one where one played good or bad, and how to improve. The program really is a very good Chess coach, and it's remarkably FREE. I would say that if one utilizes the following Chess resources one will want for nothing in terms of Chess coaching and analysis:

• Use chess.com for playing with humans , tactical and endgame training as well as indepth learning via a syllabus of interactive videos from beginner to Grand Master level
• Use decodechess.com for exceptional indepth analysis of one's entire game
• Use Lucas Chess as an AI Chess Coach 
• Use Scid as one's games database

With these 4 apps/portals one just cannot go wrong! Just make sure you have a laptop with enough processing power and ram to handle the workload when the engines start analysing! Definitely invest in a solid state drive to run one's programs on. Your RAM should be from 8 to 16GB at least. Try to have an i7 or i9 processor. Invest in a good GPU with enough RAM (4GB at least). A graphics card enables an engine like Lc0 to work properly, as the neural network requires a GPU. Stockfish 15s neural network functions off the CPU. 

Enjoy!!

Is Lucas Chess Worth it?
First of all, it is completely free, FREE !!! It's open source

Second, it is better than Chess Arena (I think it's discontinued), better than Shreeder, Fritz, Chess Aquarium, Nibbler, ChessMaster... you name it. I have all the mentioned programs plus many more (like PureChess, etc).

Third, it's fully customizable: you can make your own color and board themes, you can import any chess pieces you like (in svg format), you can install it or use the portable version and use it from a usb flash drive)

Fourth, it comes packed with almost any imaginable chess engine ready to play (it does not have commercial engines like Shredder, unless they have been made free by their owners): Rybka, Houdini, Komodo, StockFish, Lc0, etc. The las two I just mentioned are the stronger engines in the world so far. As of today June 3rd, 2024, it has 125 built-in chess engines!!!

The list of features is enormous and keeps on growing...

Now, you tell me if it worth it or not.

I can't download lucaschess idk why. Whenever I try to download it , it doesn't start downloading. It only loads the pages of source forge.

Make sure you are downloading it from the official site:
https://lucaschess.pythonanywhere.com/downloads

I tried it just now and it works, it installs properly. I tried both the portable and the full install versions under Windows.

It's surprising that no one has mentioned Arena, which is also a chess interface. The two most well-known chess interfaces are Lucas Chess and Arena. Which one is better? It's hard to say, similar to the debate between chess.com and Lichess.

Chess Arena is now called "Arena Chess GUI" since FIDE came up with their own "Chess Arena".

You can download it here, it is totally free:
http://www.playwitharena.de/

However, is light years behind LucasChess. Download it and compare it yourself. I do not use it any more. I gave up with the limited customization options, and you have to install manually each chess engine. Also, it has not been update since 2015.
Again, download all the chess programs or chess UI and compare them, specially LucasChess since it is free, open source. Then comeback and share with us which one you have found that outperforms LucasChess. I've done that, and so far not even chess aquarium comes close.

lucas chess is free, you lose nothing from it other than time. So you basically profited from it

I tried. Idk why but it doesn't get downloaded from sourceforge I think sourceforge is banned or not available in bangladesh (my country). Then I was able to download it from GitHub Alhamdulillah. It is really good for practicing and learning chess.

Download LucasChess from here (this is the official web site):

https://lucaschess.pythonanywhere.com/downloads

This link is not sourceforge or github, etc. This link is not blocked.

About the comment that LucasChess is clunky and not intuitive... I disagree. The program has a manual built in, but also is very intuitive... however, if you are trying to use it with the advance features that it offers, then yes, it is not as intuitive, but, those advanced options require that you are an advanced chess player and know what you are doing, therefore, it will be easy to know what to do. For example, if you are a beginner, simply click on PLAY and then choose an engine and start playing. That's it. All settings will be taken care for you in the background. Once you have reached, say, 2000 ELO, you will want to twick the program to push it to a higher level, for example, you would want to specify how many variants and the depth of each variant you would like the engine to work on... by then, you will know that you have to custom pick one of the strongest engines and choose those settings yourself before starting the game. As you grow in strength you will need new tools and then you will find out that the program has them... so all you have to do is explore and find what you need. I for one totally appreciate exactly how that program is design.