In this post I want to share with you my favorite picks video with chess-related content. I am going to talk about a few YouTube channels, as I believe that today YouTube is a great source of information and knowledge, when used the right way! Although you can do more research and find your favorites, I think the following list contains pretty much what one could need.
So, what YouTube channels am I going to recommend? Saint Louis Chess Club, Power Play Chess, Chess Network and World Chess.
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This is my favorite YouTube channel. The Saint Louis Chess Club has invested a lot in the past few years, in money and effort, and results are great. They organize the Grand Chess Tour, which features top-players in the world.
They offer free live streaming of all stages in the Grand Chess Tour, plus other important tournaments such as the National US Championship. The live streaming is usually hosted by GM Sairawan, WGM Shahade, GM Ashley and other guests (for example GMs Ramirez and Chirilla).
So, you can be sure that the live coverage is of absolute quality. Honestly speaking, it’s up to TV-show standards, i terms of camera views, speakers, and much more.
If you navigate the channel you will find a lot of videos with interview from GM as well as training material. It’s really worth checking it out (and as I said, it’s free).
Power Play Chess is a YouTube Channel built by GM Daniel King. The main reason why I recommend it is the absolute quality of the content. GM King is exceptionally good at transmitting his passion for the game.
What I really like is that King presents analysis of A LOT of interesting games. So it’s basically like getting analysis from a GM for free 🙂 Also, he keeps publishing videos at very fast pace, which makes the channel a recurring entry in my weekly overview.
King is also often invited to host the live commentary of some important tournament, so don’t miss the chance to watch him live there too.
ChessNetwork is the only channel among the one I recommend that is not run by a “famous” person. And yet, it has about 306 thousand subscribers! It’s impressive and definitely much more than my other recommendations.
As he (or she?) says in the About page:
I’m a self-taught National Master in chess out of Pennsylvania, USA who learned how to play from my father in 1988 at the age of 8. The purpose of this channel is to share my knowledge of chess to help others improve their game. I enjoy continuing to improve my understanding of this great game, albeit slowly.
If you navigate the “videos” section you will see really a lot of them. In fact, the channel was created back in 2007! I am not sure, but it might be a primer in the field!
The videos’ topic is quite broad, you can find basically anything. Mostly are analysis of actual games played between GM in well known tournaments. What I especially like is that often the analysis is not about the game in itself, but it’s about some specific theme that appears in the game.
World Chess is the company that acquired the rights to transmits live all events related to the World Chess Championship cycle. So basically The World Chess Championship match, the Candidate Tournament and a few more tournaments.
The reason why I am recommending their channel is because there you will find all the interviews to the players participating in those tournaments. So the number of videos is not very large, but it’s definitely top-notch!