The Chess Player's Chronicle, founded by Howard Staunton and extant in 1841–56 and 1859–62, was the world's first successful English-language magazine devoted exclusively to chess. Various unrelated but identically or similarly named publications were published until 1902.

Howard Staunton was an English chess master who is generally regarded as the world's strongest player from 1843 to 1851, largely as a result of his 1843 victory over Pierre Charles Fournier de Saint-Amant. He promoted a chess set of clearly distinguishable pieces of standardised shape – the Staunton pattern promulgated by Nathaniel Cooke – that is still the style required for competitions. He was the principal organiser of the first international chess tournament in 1851, which made England the world's leading chess centre and caused Adolf Anderssen to be recognised as the world's strongest player.