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Standalone siteFree~281k YouTube subscribers; small Patreon (~100 supporters); ChessReads Discord community

Hanging Pawns

Stjepan Tomić's adult-improver channel, with a Patreon and the ChessReads book community.

By Antoine - 2250 Lichess

Focus

Adult improvement · Openings study

Rating band

800–1800

What it is

Hanging Pawns is the YouTube channel of Stjepan Tomić, focused on adult improvement, opening theory, and patient, accessible explanation. It runs a Patreon for supporters and a Twitch channel. Tomić's newer project, ChessReads, is a free crowdsourced chess-book-review site with its own Discord - which is where the organized community actually lives. There is no large dedicated Hanging Pawns club.

Review

Hanging Pawns is built for the adult improver who wants to actually understand an opening rather than memorize ten moves. Tomić's videos are slow, thorough, and honest about his own rating - which is precisely why sub-1800 players trust them. The channel is the product; the Patreon is a tip jar more than a gated club.

The community angle is real but indirect: it lives in the Discord attached to ChessReads, his crowdsourced chess-book-review site, rather than in a Hanging Pawns hub. That makes it a good fit for readers who want to talk about chess books, and a weak fit for anyone expecting a bustling study server. Pair the opening videos with repertoire drilling on Chessableand the value is clear; join expecting a large community and it won't be there.

What works

  • Strong adult-improver focus with detailed, patient opening-theory explanations rather than clickbait.
  • The ChessReads project and its Discord add a genuine, on-topic community layer around chess literature.
  • Low-cost, low-pressure support model with no hard paywall on the core content.

What doesn't

  • The community is small and fragmented - the Patreon has roughly 100 members and the real community is the separate ChessReads Discord.
  • Patreon tier details and Discord size aren't transparently published, so the value of supporting is unclear.
  • Tomić is a strong amateur, not a titled player, so depth tops out for sub-1800 improvers.

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