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About Us: The Correspondence Chess League of America

Our non-profit organization has been conducting postal chess tournaments since 1897, as CCLA since 1909. We are a democratic organization operating under a member-approved Constitution and ByLaws, with leadership provided by member-elected Officers and Directors, all of whom have limited terms of office. Thus CCLA guarantees leadership continuity, avoiding the chaos that wipes-out small orgaizations when their owners become unwilling or unable to continue.

We offer a large selection of server and postal chess tournaments, and publish the award-winning, quarterly Chess Correspondent magazine. In fact, the Chess Correspondent has won the prestigious Chess Journalists of America award for best postal chess magazine a record six times!

CCLA is the original U.S. affiliate of ICCF, the world-wide governing body of correspondence chess. Today, CCLA aims to provide American chess players with competitive chess play using all venues. Our mission is to promote friendly chess play by correspondence for all rating classes. Under our Met League program, CCLA members may also organize teams from club or community affiliation and challenge other teams to matches played on the ICCF webserver.

CCLA organizes "friendly matches" with teams from other countries; games are unrated and strictly for fun and experience with international play. We also provide access to official international competition, including a qualifying path toward ICCF's world correspondence chess championship.

CCLA traditionally has a low drop-out rate so you are able to play most if not all of your games to completion. We cordially invite you to join us and enjoy the world of correspondence chess the CCLA way!

A Dozen Reasons to Play your Correspondence Chess Here!

  • Serverchess.com is convenient and easy to play anywhere, anytime! Play server games conveniently on your desktop computer, tablet, iPad, iPhone, or Android device. No complicated software to download, install or update.
  • Log on is quick and simple with your personal account number and password on the ICCF server at www.iccf.com, then select My Games, select a specific game, review the position, and make your next move in the convenient graphical user interface which displays the current position in your game with previous moves listed. Your opponent is notified of your move via an email message. It's that easy!
  • The server automatically notifies players by email when a new section starts and/or an opponent has played a new move, eliminating the need to log on and off the server, looking for opponents' latest moves. This email message contains a direct link to the game.
  • You can take the time you need to make your best move. All of our Postal and Server Tournaments have a 10 move in 30 days clock, allowing you adequate time to review and study the current position, and make your best move. You may take leave up to 30 days a year for vacations, illness, family or personal issues. The server automatically keeps track of the time spent by both players and will forfeit the game if you or your opponent use more time than available on your clock.
  • 100% free access for all content on CCLA's web site and the CCLA Facebook page. No annoying log-ons required.
  • No intrusive pop-ups, banner ads, screen highjacks or app store. CCLA doesn't sell merchandise or accept commercial advertising. No cookies, tracking codes or web bugs (see our privacy statement.)
  • We offer traditional postal chess events as well as server chess. Postal players may exchange moves via either USPS or email when both players agree to do so.
  • Players use their real names - no anonymous opponents or fake user names.
  • No chess engines allowed in our Traditional Chess tournaments. Chess engines may be used only in our Advanced Chess events to assist in move selection.
  • Membership includes your choice of a quarterly printed magazine mailed to your home, or for electronic membership a pdf version is sent to you via an email attachment.
  • Updated chess ratings, results and Grand Prix standings are published regularly on our website, as well as quarterly reports in The Chess Correspondent magazine.
  • Don't have a formal chess rating? No problem! If you don't have a FIDE, ICCF, USCF or other traditional numeric chess rating, just pick your approximately class level (A,B,C,D or E) and CCLA will assign your initial rating so you can play right away! Please check out our rating classes on our Rating System page.

Join CCLA today! Please visit our membership page for more information.