[SargeZT]

Yes. Every single serious chess master uses Chessbase as it has the largest database available out there even though the price is pretty obscene. The customer base is more dedicated than most and it's probably the single most important tool a chess pro can get outside of an engine itself.

Edit: It may not be the single largest database, I suspect that honor goes to Chess.com or Lichess, but it is certainly the largest curated one.

[TylerE]

It’s not even about the database per se… what’s not easily replicated are the annotated (commented/analyzed) games, high quality metadata.

This actual software, in terms of UI, is basically shit, and the technology is questionable (search really should be an order faster - my understanding is it has to do a full sequential read of the main DB (which is several GB)

[Sesse__]

Depends on what you're searching for. For position lookup, there's an index; for something like a given player, it's likely to be a linear scan.

Some format documentation:

https://web.archive.org/web/20160329061708/http://rybkaforum...

http://talkchess.com/forum/viewtopic.php?topic_view=threads&...

[SargeZT]

Oh, the software is absolutely awful, and you're spot on about the metadata (and the CBH format as a whole,) but I would also toss in another point where it's (sadly) the best: Opening prep. There just isn't much else that can compare despite the awful interface.