Greetings!
Northern California is home to one of the most plentiful chess regions in the United States.   We are one of the top five states* in membership in the U.S. Chess Federation.  


We have dozens of local chess clubs in our club list that you can drop in and enjoy a casual game.   The Mechanic's Institute Chess Club   in downtown San Francisco is in fact the oldest chess club in the U.S.   If you are serious about some competition, look at our tournament page as there is a chess tournament for almost every weekend in the year.   We have several of the top scholastic players in the United States and a few of them are even World Champion caliber for their age group.

* USCF considers Northern and Southern California two different states.

Call for Tournament Bids
      CalChess is accepting formal bids from chess tournament organizers to coordinate and manage the following annual state championships:

  • 2019 CalChess State Grade Level Championship
  • 2019 CalChess State Open Championships (Labor Day)
  • 2020 CalChess State Scholastic Championship
Proposals are expected to cover the specifics requested in the CalChess Bidding Guidelines document, located  HERE. 
      Proposals can include multi-year agreements, and should be prepared as to not conflict with other major events. CalChess will evaluate all proposals at our next board meeting in
late February / early March.  You can give an in-person presentation highlighting the specifics of your submission at this time. After reviewing all submitted plans, the CalChess Board of Directors will vote to select the individual event organizers.
      Please submit your electronic response to tom@calchess.org  by Friday, February 15th, 2019 11:59pm.
WIM Ruth Haring, 1955-2018
Northern California recently lost a extraordinary representative of our great chess community. Ruth Haring, USCF President for many years and a distinguashed member of the CalChess Board of directors, recently passed away. She will always be remembered as staying above the political strife and as an ambassador, seeking the best for CalChess, the USCF and FIDE. She will be greatly missed.
 USCF message
 Mike Klein's obituary on Chess.com
 Ruth's Wikipedia Page



Regular (Open) Tournament
Quick List
Scholastic Tournament
Quick List



Chess Puzzle of the Day

Re-Birth of the CCJ
The CalChess Board of Directors has voted to start publishing the California Chess Journal again. In March, Eric Schiller created a Winter 2009 issue ( see back issues), later we had well-known writer Frisco Del Rosario create a Summer 2010, up to January 2011 issue. Next we had the young and talented Aditya Kumar as editor for two issues in 2012. Scott Mason took over for a few issues, Until October 2014. After a dry spell we have the award winning Frisco Del Rosario back with the lastest issue see below. With your support, we are hoping to continue publishing an electronic version on a more regular basis. Once we get this established, issues will be FREE and emailed to all current CalChess members.

If you are interested in receiving a copy, make sure your membership is up-to-date, by checking for your name on the Membership List. We will also publish back issues on the website.