So you like chess, free software, and being useful? Great! We need your help making Lichess better. Even if you can't code, don't worry, there are plenty of ways to contribute to the Lichess project.

Translate to your native language

Lichess currently supports 80 different languages, but there's plenty more to do. Many more languages need to be started and several languages are near completion. If you speak a language that currently isn't (fully) supported by Lichess, we'd love for you to help us out. Head over to the translation center to get started.

Provide a server for chess analysis

Lichess provides computer analysis for free to all users. The world-class open source Stockfish engine is used to analyse players games (example of an analysed game).

This is a CPU intensive operation, and requires many servers in order to provide fast and accurate analysis.

If you have spare CPU power, you can help by running the fishnet client.

Content

Lichess provides content across multiple areas. To support that, different teams are responsible for creating content and maintaining existing resources.

If you're interested in contributing, join the dedicated Lichess Content Discord server - everyone is welcome. If there's a particular team or area you want to help in, you can also send a direct message (DM) on Lichess to @NoJoke.

Broadcast Team

The broadcast team is responsible for maintaining https://lichess.org/broadcast.

They scout for upcoming tournaments, gather relevant information and contact the organizers for the live PGN sources. Lichess also features user-created broadcasts which are then supervised by the team as well.

Another important contribution is to monitor ongoing broadcasts to fix transmission errors, correct schedules, and make any other necessary updates.

Designers

While the need for design work is not as consistent as for broadcast management, there are still plenty of opportunities to get involved as a designer at Lichess to create social media posts, thumbnails, etc. If you want to help out, check out the design channels in our dedicated Lichess Content Discord server.

Video Team

The responsibility of the video team is to update and expand Lichess’s video library. New videos need to be verified for quality, tagged by topic and entered into the system. The team also reviews the existing library to ensure all videos are still available.

Design

Lichess is constantly under development, new features and designs are implemented on a weekly (if not more frequent) basis, but we don't always get it right; that's where you can help us out. If you see something that could be improved, or done differently there's a few ways you can see your change implemented:

• Design how you think the site should look in a graphical suite such as Photoshop. This will help the designers more directly approach and implement a solution. In most cases this is far more useful than a lengthy written document.
• Know a thing or two about HTML and CSS? Even better! Head on over to our GitHub page and create a pull request with the change you would like to see implemented. It's as easy as editing the source-code in-browser (right click > inspect element), and then pasting the changes to the necessary files in the Git repository.

We're also looking for skilled or enthusiast graphical designers to help with upcoming projects. Enquire on Discord to find out more.

Write code

So you can code, eh? That's great! Join us on discord and we'll find an interesting challenge for your skills. Also check out our wiki to learn how to install Lichess on your dev machine. New devs should check out our "good first issue" project.

Talk about Lichess

Being totally free, Lichess has no money for advertising itself. Therefore we rely on the community effort to spread the word and get more players to discover the site.

Do you have a blog? Write an article about Lichess!

Do you use twitter, facebook or other social medias? Let your followers know about your favorite chess site!

Do you know chess players? Do you play in real-world chess tournaments or chess federations? Spread the word! We need more people like you.

Show Lichess TV on your website

Let your visitors spectate the best realtime chess matches on Lichess!

Join the streamer community program

Donate

Wanna help paying for the lichess.org servers? Check the donation page. Your help will make a big difference.