Terms of Service
Last updated: 2026-09-09
These terms cover your use of Shahmat.org (the "site"). By creating an account or using the site, you agree to them. We've kept this in plain language on purpose.
Your account
- You're responsible for keeping your login credentials secure and for activity that happens under your account.
- One account per person. Creating extra accounts to manipulate ratings, matchmaking, or leaderboards isn't allowed — see our Fair Play & Anti-Cheat Policy.
- You need to provide a working email address to verify your account and to receive account-related messages like password resets.
- You can ask us to delete your account and data at any time — see Privacy Policy.
Acceptable use
- Play fairly. Using external chess engines, other people, or any outside assistance during a live rated game against another human is not allowed. See Fair Play & Anti-Cheat for what's fine and what isn't.
- Treat other players, spectators, and coaches with respect in chat, voice chat, usernames, and profile content. See Community Guidelines.
- Don't attempt to disrupt the service — no scraping at abusive rates, no attempting to break authentication or matchmaking, no automating gameplay outside of the bots we provide for practice.
- Don't use the site for anything illegal, or to harass, impersonate, or defraud anyone.
Payments, donations & refunds
Coaches listed on Shahmat.org apply and are reviewed before being listed, but we don't guarantee the quality of any individual lesson. Payments for lessons and donations are processed by the payment provider you choose at checkout (currently Click, Payme, or a card via Paddle, depending on availability) — we don't store your full card or payment credentials ourselves.
Donations made through the Gift page are a voluntary way to support the site and are non-refundable, except where a payment was made in error — for example a duplicate charge or an amount you didn't intend to enter — or where required by law. If that happens, contact us at contact@shahmat.org within 14 days of the charge and we'll make it right.
A paid coaching lesson can be cancelled and refunded up to 24 hours before its scheduled time by contacting us at the address above; cancellations after that window are handled between you and the coach directly.
Content you create
You keep ownership of what you create on the site — profile text, chat messages, collections, and the like. By posting it, you give us permission to store and display it back to you and to other users as the relevant feature intends (e.g. a public profile, a shared collection, an in-game chat message).
The service itself
Shahmat.org is provided "as is." We work to keep it reliable, but we don't guarantee uninterrupted access, that bots or analysis will always be available, or that the site will be error-free. Features described as in-progress or "coming soon" may change before they ship.
Limitation of liability
To the extent permitted by law, Shahmat.org and its operators aren't liable for indirect or incidental damages arising from your use of the site. Nothing here limits liability where the law doesn't allow it to be limited.
Suspension & termination
We may suspend or close an account that violates these terms, our Fair Play policy, or our Community Guidelines. Where reasonable, we'll try to explain why — see Contact if you think a decision was made in error.
Changes to these terms
If we make a meaningful change, we'll update the date at the top of this page.
Contact
Questions about these terms: contact@shahmat.org.