Stockfish vs Torch: Which Chess Engine Is Stronger?

The Short Answer

Quick answer: Stockfish is stronger. Torch is Chess.com's own engine, and it finished second behind Stockfish in Chess.com's computer championships. Stockfish is also free and open source, and it runs almost anywhere. Torch runs only on Chess.com's Analysis page. For reviewing your own games, either one is far stronger than you need.

That's the verdict for October 2026.

The rest of this post explains what Torch is, where each engine shows up, and when the choice matters.

What Torch Is

Torch is a chess engine built by Chess.com.

I read Chess.com's July 2023 announcement. It named the team: Andrew Grant of Ethereal, Finn Eggers and Kim Kåhre of Koivisto, Jay Honnold of Berserk, and Michael Whiteley and Dietrich Kappe of Dragon.

Those are all engine authors. Chess.com funded them to work together on one engine.

The post says Torch's source code is original, with no code taken from any other engine. It also says the goal was to become number one.

Torch is closed source. You can't download it and run it on your own computer.

What Stockfish Is

Stockfish is a free engine, and many chess sites run it.

The Stockfish website describes it as free, open source and cross platform. It runs on Windows, macOS, Linux, Android and iOS. The code is under the GPLv3 license, so anyone can read it and contribute.

The newest version is Stockfish 19, released on September 5, 2026. The release post says it gains up to 44 Elo over Stockfish 18 in their tests.

The site also lists the platforms it powers. Lichess and Chess.com are both on that list.

Which One Is Stronger

Stockfish, on every source I checked.

Chess.com's own July 2023 post called Torch the new number two engine. The Wikipedia article on Chess.com says Torch finished second in several Chess.com Computer Chess Championship events, behind Stockfish each time.

In July 2024, Chess.com said Torch had taken the number two spot from Leela.

So Torch beat strong engines. It just didn't beat Stockfish in those events.

The Stockfish site puts it plainly. It lists Stockfish as a winner of both the Top Chess Engine Championship and the Chess.com Computer Chess Championship.

Torch Changed Its Goal

There's a detail most comparisons miss.

The Wikipedia article on Chess.com says that on June 19, 2024, Andrew Grant announced a new focus for Torch. Future work would aim at making it a Chess.com power tool, not at raw Elo strength.

That changes how to read the rivalry. Stockfish is still built to win engine championships. Torch, after mid 2024, is built to serve Chess.com's features.

So "Is Torch better than Stockfish?" is partly the wrong question. They're no longer chasing the same target.

Where You Can Use Torch

Torch lives on one page: Chess.com's Analysis board.

Chess.com's July 2024 news post explains the steps. Open Analysis, click the cog icon at the top right of the board, and pick Torch from the Chess Engine menu.

That same post said members can use it. It also offers two versions. One is lighter and much faster, with a miniature neural network. The other is the full version.

There's one more note in that post. Some versions of Torch use neural networks partly trained on data published by the Leela Chess Zero team.

Outside Chess.com, there's no way to run Torch.

What Game Review Runs

This is the question most Chess.com players really care about.

I read Chess.com's help article on its engines. It says the engines Chess.com runs on its servers are modern ones, at the moment Stockfish 18 with the full neural network.

That includes Game Review. It also includes the accuracy scores you see.

So your Game Review comes from Stockfish, not Torch.

One caveat. Stockfish 19 came out in September 2026, and that help article still named Stockfish 18 when I checked. Chess.com may update it later.

The Analysis Board Default

There's a second detail in that help article, and it affects free accounts.

On chess.com/analysis, basic users can use Stockfish 18 on most browsers. But the default is a Lite version. It uses only the handcrafted evaluation, with no neural network.

The reason is size. The full network is 108 MB, and Chess.com doesn't force that download on every visitor.

Members can turn on the full version in settings. They can also raise the maximum depth to 99, which means no limit.

So two people can run "Stockfish" on the same page and get different strength.

Side by Side

Here's the comparison in one table:

The table makes the choice easy for most people. If you want an engine you can run anywhere, it's Stockfish.

Does the Difference Matter for You?

For your own games, probably not.

Both engines play far above any human. A gap that decides engine championships rarely changes what you learn from a game at club level.

What matters more is how you use the engine. Running it at too low a depth, or reading the number without understanding it, wastes more than any engine gap.

Our guide to what an engine evaluation score really means covers that. It explains what +1.5 means and when to trust it.

The engine is a tool. The thinking is still yours.

When Torch Is Worth Trying

Torch is worth a look if you're already a Chess.com member.

A second opinion can help in sharp positions. If Stockfish and Torch both pick the same move, you can trust it more. If they disagree, the position is probably harder than it looks, and that's worth studying.

The lighter Torch version is also handy on slow devices, because Chess.com says it's much faster.

If you're deciding whether a membership is worth it, our guide to Chess.com Gold, Platinum and Diamond breaks down what each plan adds.

Where Leela and Komodo Fit

Torch and Stockfish aren't the only strong engines.

Leela Chess Zero learns from self play with a neural network. Komodo Dragon is a commercial engine that Chess.com bought in 2018, according to Wikipedia.

Both of Torch's rivals connect to it. Two of the Torch team, Michael Whiteley and Dietrich Kappe, are the current authors of Dragon. And some Torch networks were partly trained on Leela data.

We compared the other three in detail in our Stockfish vs Leela vs Komodo guide, including which one suits which kind of analysis.

Free Ways to Use Stockfish

You don't need a paid plan to get full strength Stockfish.

Lichess runs Stockfish, and the Stockfish site lists it among the platforms it powers. That's the easiest free route in a browser.

You can also download Stockfish itself from its official site and load it into a chess program on your computer or phone.

If you split your play between both sites, our guide to Lichess vs Chess.com analysis shows a simple workflow for reviewing games on either one.

The Bottom Line

Pick Stockfish if you want the strongest engine, free, on any device. It's the default for good reason.

Try Torch if you're a Chess.com member and want a second opinion on the Analysis board.

Don't overthink it, though. The engine you use matters far less than how often you review your games.

Play, review, then practice what you got wrong. You can play a training game against a bot here on CheckmateX, then run the game through either engine.

That loop improves your chess. Swapping engines won't.