Making Laid-Back Content Out Of Fierce Chess Skills

WIM Anna Kantane, known on Twitch and YouTube as KantannaChess always balances her enthusiastic streaming with an active playing career and motherhood. Anna has been streaming and creating content for 2.5 years, and continues to grow her audience with an approach focused on kindness and community. As our Chess.com Creator of the Month for April 2026, Anna discussed her stream, her career, and her life.

How long have you been creating chess content, and what made you decide to start?

I started streaming in November 2023. I got back to OTB chess that year, after a few years on a break, and thought that streaming could be a fun way to stay motivated to play and train more. 

What it's like playing competitively while also streaming more casually?

Playing competitively can be tricky for me. As a mom, I have to make a living. And then there is my chess streaming and coaching. Then there's my own chess, playing over the board, which is my little space just for me. If I was not a streamer, it would be much harder for me to focus on that, but a community like mine is great motivation. I come on stream and there are people who are interested in what I do, and we can kind of do it together.

Otherwise, as adults it's so easy with family and work to lose track of the days, but this is something that helps me find time for my own training. So we also train some tactics on stream.

What’s your favorite thing about creating? What makes it fun?

For me, it’s definitely the connection with the community. That’s why I enjoy streaming more than, for example, creating videos—although that can be a lot of fun too! 

Interacting with people, exchanging experiences, and sharing a common passion, while motivating each other to improve—there’s something both joyful and really beautiful in that.

As an adult improver with many responsibilities—family, work, and everything else—it can be difficult to find the time and energy to focus on your passion. Having a community, and not feeling alone in that journey, makes a huge difference. I try to be that source of support for my chat, but they are just as much that for me, or more! For example, I do get a lot of motivation from the community to play more OTB and whenever I do - they support me a lot, which make it all so much more rewarding.

Who are some of your favorite chess content creators, and why?

I was inspired by the Botez sisters, who, early on, organized a lot of events for female players. Their efforts encouraged many to actually pursue streaming and opened up some opportunities within the community. I have also always admired IM Anna Rudolf and WFM Anna Cramling. They are not only kind people and fun, but truly unique in their approach, making them a joy to watch and learn from. Of course, there are many other wonderful content creators as well, and over time some have become friends, which is one of the most special aspects of streaming!

What is your single favorite piece of chess content that was created by someone else?

I don't consume that much content myself, but I've always loved Anna Cramling's videos together with her parents, especially her mom, GM Pia Cramling. It's such an amazing mix—you have fun, you can feel kindness radiating from them, but also lots of fierce chess!

Is that mix of "radiating kindness" and playing "fierce chess" something you try to emulate?

The online space can be so tricky. We should all try to be kind to each other, especially nowadays. I think most of the people who come to the stream are looking for it too. We want to connect over something that brings positivity to our life, and I hope people who visit the stream and are part of the community get this feeling from my content.

And fierce chess, I definitely love sacrificing. When I was a kid, my favorite players were Paul Morphy and GM Judit Polgar, and that style is still part of my chess. Not at their level, of course.

Imagine you could do a chess-based collab with anyone in the world. Who would it be, and why?

That's a fun question! I think everyone would like a collab with Judit, because she is the best

But other than chess, I love tennis, so having a collab with Roger Federer and Rafa Nadal (preferably both!) would be a dream come true!

Can you tell us a little bit about your creative process?

I honestly don’t have a very structured creative process. As I mentioned, I’m also a mom, then a chess coach, and then a streamer. That said, streaming is very important to me, especially as a way to keep the passion side of chess alive, and I hope it brings that same feeling to my community!

Do you think being a coach helps your streaming and content?

Hopefully

But probably that's better a question to people who watch. As a coach, you need to be able to have both empathy and communication skills. Both are also important in streaming.

Has your audience changed or grown at all since you started streaming on Chess.com?

I haven't been streaming that long here, and in that time I also had two rather long trips. In one of them I was organizing a tournament for women in Poland, and there were some streams on my channel, and the other one I was playing myself in an over-the-board event in Serbia. But for sure, Chess.com is a way to open streamers and content creators to a wider audience, and I think we are all grateful for it.

Would you ever travel specifically to make content?

That would be fun for sure. Playing over-the-board tournaments takes a lot of time and is quite expensive too, but it's definitely motivating that I can turn it into some kind of content. It's a win-win. Now, in Serbia, I was streaming my games, too, and had commentators.

An additional benefit, and I think additional motivation, for me and for my community is when they see that you can play and that you can fight, and then they hopefully get more motivated to do it as well. Even when they see stupid blunders, it's okay if I'm a titled player and do it too.

In 2026, my focus is more on preparing for OTB tournaments where eventually I want to fight for my last WGM norm, and also a woman grandmaster title. The training we do on stream, and generally a lot of my content, naturally revolves around that. At the same time, I see it as a way to share the journey and hopefully be a source of motivation for others.