XQ Arena: Chinese Chess

Chinese chess, made easy to love. Learn from zero, beat seven masters and run your own tournaments, with battle effects, 19 languages and iPad play. Free, no ads.

Xiangqi, or Chinese chess, is the classic strategy game of China, played for centuries. XQ Arena makes it easy to start, even if you have never seen the board and cannot read a single Chinese character.

LEARN IT STEP BY STEP Pao, our cannon, teaches you. Short lessons, one idea each, played out on a real board you tap. Where the pieces go, why the horse can be blocked, why the elephant never crosses the river, and how a cannon takes a piece by jumping over one. No walls of text. You play every step.

PIECES YOU CAN ACTUALLY READ Choose traditional Chinese characters, clear pictures of each piece, or both together with a small character in the corner so the writing sinks in while you play. It is your own setting. Your opponent still sees the board the way they like it.

SEVEN MASTERS TO BEAT Climb the Arena ladder from Bing the soldier to Shuai the general. Each one plays with its own character and a little more strength than the last. No hints and no takebacks on the ladder, so a win is a real win.

PLAY ONLINE Play someone online, or send a friend a six character code. Rated games, a proper clock, and a rating that moves the way it should.

RUN YOUR OWN TOURNAMENT Create a tournament for 4 to 16 players, knockout or round robin, and invite people with its code, or browse the open ones and join. When the seats fill, it starts. Play each match when it suits you both, inside the window the host set, follow the bracket or the table as it fills in, and take the podium trophies home.

CLIMB THE RANKS, EARN THE SETS Bronze to Imperial General, nine families of ranks with a badge for each. Trophies for winning, a daily chest, quests and a streak that rewards showing up. Each new rank can unlock a board or a set of pieces made the way a Chinese museum piece is made: blue and white porcelain, cloisonné, Dali marble, celadon, carved cinnabar, and palace lanterns at the very top. Once earned, yours for good.

SHARE YOUR GAMES Follow players you like, post your best games and positions, and comment and react on theirs. Every board is drawn from the real moves or position, so what you share is the real game. The community is filtered and moderated, with report, mute and block on every post, comment and profile. Turn a win or a new rank into a card for your story in a couple of taps.

MADE WITH CARE Every piece is drawn by hand. Five boards to start with, from classic wood to porcelain blue and jade, and six more boards and six piece sets of Chinese craft to earn as you play and climb the ranks. Sound that lands like a real piece on a real board, and you can turn all of it off. Works with big text, reduced motion and a screen reader.

YOUR ACCOUNT, YOUR CHOICE Play as a guest, with no sign-in at all, or sign in with Apple or Google so your account is safe on your next phone. There are no ads and nothing to buy inside the app, and your data is never sold.