game occasionally freezes or won't start

Hi All, i'm new to chess.com and have had a problem with the game freezing and wondering if it's a common problem or something specific to me or my device.

I'm using the ChessUp2 board (via wifi, no phone) and playing the Bots.  Sometimes it just freezes waiting for the Bot to start, other times it's when it's waiting for the Bot to move.  It actually doesn't happen a lot, but I'd like to get it resolved before i start playing other people.

Has anybody else had issues?  

Hey @noluck987 👋 Welcome to Chess.com!

Thanks for sharing — you're not alone in seeing occasional freezes, especially when using a connected device like the ChessUp2 board. Since you're using it over WiFi without a phone, that might be causing some of the issues with syncing or delays in bot responses.

A few things to try:

• Make sure the firmware on your ChessUp2 is fully updated.

• Check your WiFi connection for any drops or slowdowns.

• Try reconnecting the board or restarting the Chess.com session when it hangs.

• If you're able to test using a phone or different device just once, that could help narrow it down.

It’s probably not a major issue — just a communication delay or pairing glitch. Still, it might be worth reporting it to Chess.com Support if it keeps happening. Better to get it sorted before jumping into live games!

Hope it smooths out soon — good luck!

@JosephReidNZ ♟️

Thanks JR.

Firmware is latest.

WiFi works fine with other devices, but ChessUp doesn't provided any signal strength indicator to know for sure how strong a connection IT has.

The only solution when it hangs is to pwr-cycle the ChessUp. It won't let me resign or anything. I'm thinking it's either the ChessUp firmware or a weakness in the chess.com protocol that doesn't recover from certain errors. That's why I was wondering if it happens with other devices.

I did play a bunch of bot games on chess.com while i was choosing & ordering a board. I had no glitches with my PC->wifi->chess.com.

I wonder if running a packet sniffer on the wifi would tell me anything.

Hey @noluck987 — thanks for the detailed follow-up!

You're probably right that the issue lies somewhere between ChessUp's firmware and how it communicates with Chess.com’s servers. If you're having to power cycle to regain control, that sounds like a connection-handling bug or a failure to recover from a timeout.

Since your PC connection works perfectly fine, and you’re not seeing issues outside the board connection, that narrows it down quite a bit.

Running a packet sniffer could help, but only if you're comfortable digging through the network traffic — though I imagine most users shouldn't have to go that far 😅. It might be worth also checking if there are any firmware logs or developer tools available via ChessUp's app or web dashboard (if they provide one).

In the meantime, I’d recommend:

• Sending this info to both Chess.com Support and ChessUp’s support team — especially noting the need to power-cycle to regain control.

• Mentioning the lack of a signal strength indicator — that's a useful observation they might not hear often.

Appreciate how clearly you’ve explained it — hopefully, someone on the dev side picks this up and gets a fix in the pipeline soon!

@JosephReidNZ ♟️

All great advice, thanks.

I read another thread where a guy made a webpage that would listen-only to the BT traffic to detect piece movement on the board (for a coordinate location game he was making). I may try and dust off my .net skills and see if i can see that traffic. If I can do that, there is probably traffic during a bot game as well, and that may give me a clue to where the comm is hanging up.

I'll also post to support as you suggest. thanks

That sounds awesome @noluck987 — I’m seriously impressed with your willingness to dig into the traffic side of things! If you do manage to capture that BT signal or observe the traffic during a bot game, it could help narrow down where the breakdown is happening.

Also, love that you’re dusting off the .NET skills — that might come in super handy here. Even being able to confirm whether traffic stops altogether or continues normally would be valuable information for both support teams.

Good luck with the testing, and let us know if you discover anything useful. Could end up helping others with similar setups, too!

@JosephReidNZ ♟️