Kessen

⚡ ELO Rating

Rankings use the ELO system from chess. Beating a higher-ranked anime gains more points; losing to a lower-ranked one costs more. More battles = more reliable ranking.

🏷 Tiers

Calculated dynamically from your ELO rankings: S top 10% · A 10–25% · B 25–55% · C 55–80% · D bottom 20%. Anime you haven't battled yet show as Unranked and sit outside the tiers until their first battle.

● Confidence

Uncertain — fewer than 3 battles, don't trust this rank yet.
Settling — 3–9 battles, getting more reliable.
Confident — 10+ battles, stable.

〰️ Fuzzy & ✗ Not Seen

Fuzzy — can't judge an anime fairly because you don't remember it well? Mark it fuzzy and it'll appear far less often until you've refreshed your memory.
Not Seen — removes the anime from your ranking pool entirely. Re-add it any time from the Excluded section at the bottom of Rankings.

↩ Undo

Changed your mind? Undo reverts your last battle result, restoring both ELO scores. You can undo up to 5 battles in a row.

⚙ Battle Modes

Tap the mode button in the battle screen to switch between:

⚙ Standard — default matchmaking, pairs chosen to maximise ranking accuracy.
🎯 Settle — targets uncertain matchups first so shaky rankings lock in faster.
🙈 Blind — hides ELO scores so you pick purely on instinct, without being anchored by numbers.
🎲 Trio — three anime at once; drag or tap to rank them 1st, 2nd, 3rd.
🔥 Winner Stays On — the champion keeps fighting until knocked off, with a streak counter. Great for finding your true top picks.
⚡ Tower — pick a champion and pit it against 10 opponents spread across the rankings. A fun way to stress-test how highly you really rate a show.

≡ Battle Pool Filter

Tap the Filter button in the battle screen to choose which formats (TV, Movie, OVA…) stay in the matchmaking pool — useful if you only want to rank one type at a time — and whether shows you're currently watching or rewatching are kept out until you've finished them. The same popover has an Avoid same franchise toggle that stops the picker from pairing sequels against each other (so you don't keep getting AoT S1 vs AoT S2). All of these persist between sessions.

⚔ Battle Next

Tapping an anime card opens its detail view, where you can hit ⚔ Battle Next to queue it as one side of your next battle against a similar-ELO opponent. Great for "wait, why is this ranked so low?" moments.

⌨️ Keyboard Shortcuts

← left wins  ·  → right wins  ·  S skip  ·  U undo

📋 Rankings

Title search at the top, then a row of filter chips: + Genre, + Studio, + Year, + Format, + Length, + Status (ranked or unranked). Each opens a popover listing the actual values from your list with counts, so you can see at a glance what's worth filtering by. Picks become removable chips — combine across categories (AND) or pick multiple values in one category (OR). One ⤫ Clear filters button wipes everything. Sort by ELO, Title, Win Rate, Battles, AniList Avg, or Confidence. Toggle grid or list view. Fuzzy-only and Franchise mode live in the row below.

⛓ Franchise Mode

Groups sequels and seasons together in the Rankings view so you can see a franchise's overall standing at a glance. Each franchise card shows its Avg ELO, a ★ Best badge for its highest-rated entry, and how consistently you rate its entries (Consistent / Mixed / Divisive). Unranked entries (never battled and still at the starting 1200 ELO) are left out of all three. A franchise's confidence is based on the average number of battles per ranked entry. Tap a card to drill in, then use:

⚔ Battle within — restrict the next battles to entries inside the franchise so you can settle "which Re:Zero season is best?". Auto-stops once every pair has been battled. Works in Standard and Blind mode; the other modes are greyed out until it stops.
🚫 Exclude all from battles — bulk-remove the whole franchise from your battle pool (with undo).

The usual Sort menu applies to franchises too: ELO sorts by the franchise average, Battles by the total across its entries, Confidence by battles per entry. A battle between two of a franchise's own entries counts once and doesn't change its win rate, except in Tower runs.

📊 Tabs

Battles — stats, biggest upsets, rivalries, and full battle history. Total Battles + Fuzzy Flagged tiles are clickable shortcuts.
Profile — two sub-tabs: Taste (your archetype, genre & era breakdowns, studio affinity, taste vs the community, score distribution) and Achievements (milestones and badges earned through ranking).
Discover — four sub-tabs: For You (recs based on your top-rated anime, with mood chips at the top for one-tap Comforting / Devastating / Intense / Thought-provoking / Beautiful filters), This Season (airing now + next), Predict (tier guess for any anime you haven't ranked), and Missing (sequels, prequels, spin-offs and side stories you have in your list but haven't watched yet — filter them by format and by relation type; recap and compilation films are hidden unless you switch the Recap chip on — Kessen spots them from AniList's relation type, the title, and the synopsis). Cards that strongly match your taste get a 🎯 Strong match badge.
Social — multiplayer modes and taste comparison (see below).
Manage — backup, export, sync to AniList or MAL, appearance, notification settings, and reset.

👥 Social

🤝 Watch Together — co-op picker for what to watch tonight. Nominate shows (or pull from this season), then vote head-to-head until one wins.
🎮 Challenge Mode — solo guessing game. Type any AniList username (or a MAL one, if you're signed in with MyAnimeList) and guess which of two of their anime they ranked higher. No signup or invite needed for your friend.
🌐 Live Challenge — together, real-time. Each round you both pick a winner and predict each other's pick — bonus points for reading them right.
Taste Compare — enter any AniList username (or a MAL one, if you're signed in with MyAnimeList) to see how your rankings overlap, where you disagree, and get cross-taste recommendations. Recent comparisons sit under the box as chips — tap one to re-run it.

🔗 Share

The Share button on the results page makes an image of your Top 10 (rank, title and ELO) and shows you a preview. Where your device has a share sheet the image goes straight to it; otherwise it downloads, and on desktop you can also copy it to the clipboard. Long-press or right-click the preview to save it.

Tap Create link for a short link that opens the same top 10 in a browser — tap an anime there to open its AniList page (MyAnimeList if you signed in with MAL). A link lasts 12 months and shows your AniList or MyAnimeList username only when you share your own list while signed in.

🔮 Predict

Search any anime you haven't ranked — Kessen estimates the tier it would likely land in based on your genre preferences, era affinities, and how your taste compares to the community. The more you've ranked, the more accurate the prediction.

🔔 Notifications

The bell icon in the header shows alerts for anime newly added to or removed from your list, finish-watching prompts, and a one-time ✨ What's new entry whenever Kessen updates to a new version (tap it to see the release highlights). Tap the bell to open the notification centre and review or clear alerts.

🔒 Your data

Your rankings are saved on this device and, when you're signed in, your own list is backed up to the cloud so it syncs between your devices. Manage → Delete all my data deletes them from both, along with your push notification sign-up and synced notifications, and logs you out. Log out on your other devices first, or they can upload their copy again. If you're not signed in, it clears this device only.

☁️ Cloud Sync

When logged in with AniList or MAL, your own list (your AniList list if you're signed in to both) automatically saves to the cloud after each battle (with a short delay). A guest list, or a list opened by typing a username, stays on this device. Opening your list on another device will prompt you to load the cloud save if it's newer than your local one. You can also push or pull your own list manually any time from Manage → Backup, Sync & Export.

🔵 AniList Integration

On first load — your AniList scores seed starting ELO values (10→1500 · 7→1200 · 4→900), so rankings begin close to where you already know they should be.

Sync to AniList (Manage tab) — push your ELO rankings back to AniList as updated scores. You'll see a preview of every change before confirming.

Re-seed from AniList (Manage tab) — re-pull your current AniList scores and replace ELO values with fresh starting points, without erasing battle history.

📋 MAL Integration

On first load — your MAL scores seed starting ELO values (10→1500 · 7→1200 · 4→900), giving your rankings a head start based on what you already know.

Re-seed from MAL (Manage tab) — re-pull your current MAL scores and replace ELO values with fresh starting points, without erasing battle history.

Discover & Stats — fully supported. Recommendations are powered by AniList's public database, which is also where cover art and metadata come from.

Social features (taste comparison, friend recs & Challenge) take AniList or MAL usernames — pick which with the AniList / MAL switch on the Social tab.