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Best Online D&D Tools

If you want to play D&D online, these services will help you ditch the pen and paper.

Dungeons & Dragons has been around for decades, but we’re in the middle of a D&D renaissance that’s breathing new life and new players into the world’s best-known tabletop RPG. There’s a new movie coming out in April, and Amazon studios just inked a major deal in January to bring more Critical Role adventures, such as Legend of Vox Machina, to Prime Video. 

Critical Role, along with similar tabletop RPG shows like Dimension 20, have introduced more people to the game, and online video chat apps have made it easier to pull a D&D group together. There are plenty of D&D tools that allow you to play the game online, but it can be a chore to go through each one and understand what it offers, what it doesn’t and how easy it is to use.

We looked at three of the most popular online D&D services — D&D Beyond, Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds — testing each one on a variety of basics: 

  • How easy was it to build a character sheet? 
  • How well did the service guide new players through the process? 
  • How effective and easy to use was the map function, if it had one? 
  • What does the service add to the D&D experience, and what does it limit?

Each service has different strengths and drawbacks, and we looked at them through the eyes of both experienced and inexperienced players to see how they compared.

Read more: D&D Dragonlance Reboot Is More Than Nostalgia, Less Than It Could Be

If you’re new to the game and mainly interested in trying out a tabletop RPG, D&D Beyond makes it easy to get a character sheet and campaign up and running. If you want everything you need in one place with relatively little fuss, check out Roll20. And for D&D power gamers, Fantasy Grounds allows you amazing levels of automation and control once you invest the time to learn it.

So whether your play group has scattered to different cities, or maybe it’s just easier for everyone to jump on a Zoom call once a week (or month), here are our picks for the best D&D tools to use online.

Best online D&D tools

Fandom

D&D Beyond

Best for beginners and free accounts

Likes

  • Extremely easy to pick up and get started
  • Design is simple and easy to navigate
  • Impressive features for free accounts

Dislikes

  • No interactive map feature
  • Limited to Dungeons & Dragons

D&D Beyond was already a popular service long before it was bought by Hasbro, which also owns D&D publisher Wizards of the Coast. It’s a straightforward tool that makes creating characters fun by simplifying most of the process. For people who are new to the game, there’s no easier way to get started. 

D&D Beyond’s online character creator is free, allowing you to try different character builds without having to spend a dime. Free accounts only have access to the basic rules (including races and classes), and are limited to six characters, but that should be plenty for most new players.

If you want to invest in your D&D games, you can buy digital versions of official D&D books in a few different flavors. D&D Beyond offers sourcebooks, like Tasha’s Cauldron of Everything and Explorer’s Guide to Wildemount, which give you new settings and character options. It also offers adventure books, like Curse of Strahd and Candlekeep Mysteries, which DMs can use to run campaigns. Both types of books are typically $30 apiece, though some smaller packages cost less. 

You can also buy a subscription at either the Hero tier ($3 per month) or the Master tier ($6 per month) to unlock extra features. The Hero tier allows you to make as many character sheets as you want and also opens up access to test new D&D Beyond tools. The Master tier adds the option to share content from any of your purchased books with the rest of the players in your campaign.

A Hero tier subscription isn’t great value unless you play in a lot of D&D groups (more than six). The real value of a subscription is sharing content with the Master Tier — that $6 per month allows you to share features from sourcebooks and adventure books with your entire group, rather than requiring everyone to buy their own copy. A DM with a Master-tier subscription can spend $6 per month and share purchased content with the rest of the group even if they have free accounts. 

The primary drawback of D&D Beyond is that it focuses on character sheets, not other elements of a D&D table. Most notably, it lacks meaningful map features to help your group visualize combat and exploration. If your gaming sessions focus on those elements, you’ll need to supplement with your own maps or the map tools of our other top picks. Both Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds offer useful map features.

But of the tools we tested, D&D Beyond was far and away the simplest to get started with. It walks you through each step of the process — choosing a race and class for your character, constructing your build as you level your character, and navigating the rest of the starting options. For options and systems that are a little confusing, you’ll have the ability to read through more detailed explanations in popups. If you’re trying D&D for the first time or you just want an easy way to manage your character sheet, D&D Beyond should be your first stop.

See at D&D Beyond

Roll20

Roll20

Best all-in-one tool

Likes

  • Character sheets, maps and dice in one tool
  • Interactive maps that are easy to learn
  • Includes video chat

Dislikes

  • Overall design is a little messy
  • DMs have to give other players character sheets to fill out

If you’re looking for a one-stop shop for all your D&D gaming, we recommend Roll20 for its versatility. Roll20 offers practically everything you could ask for in a virtual D&D tool: You’ll be able to make characters and play out epic battles on an interactive map, all without even needing an external service for video or voice chat. The tradeoff is a little more time spent figuring out how features work. 

Everything in Roll20 is run through its Games feature, and your DM will need to create a game for everyone to get started. The DM can then invite players to join through emailed invitations or simple copy-and-paste links. Once everyone’s in, the DM can create blank character sheets and assign those characters out to players for them to customize. 

Players can create their characters using Roll20’s Charactermancer tool, which walks them step by step through the character creation process, similar to D&D Beyond. You’ll see snippets from the core rules to help explain any new or confusing features. At the end of the process, your character sheet will be set up and ready to go. You also have the option of pulling up a blank character sheet and filling it out directly, which may be appealing for more experienced players, but the Charactermancer is generally the simpler option. 

The Roll20 character sheets don’t feel quite as stylish or easy to navigate as D&D Beyond’s, but Roll20 makes up for it with a variety of other features you won’t find on D&D Beyond. The biggest one is interactive maps. DMs can create maps for their campaigns, allowing your group to traverse dungeons and engage in battles more tactically. DMs can use fog of war to limit map vision to what players can actually see, and players can move tokens representing their characters around the map, just like you would at a physical table.

Like the other online D&D tools we reviewed, Roll20 has a marketplace where you can buy digital versions of sourcebooks and adventure books, which unlock new features for your character sheets and maps. The costs will generally match what you see in D&D Beyond and Fantasy Grounds, so don’t worry too much about bargain hunting. The biggest difference is that Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds also offer books from other tabletop RPGs like Pathfinder and Call of Cthulhu, whereas D&D Beyond is strictly based on Dungeons & Dragons.

Roll20 offers free accounts and two subscription options that unlock additional features. Like D&D Beyond, you can pay $6 per month (discounted to $50 annually if you pay upfront) to share purchased content with other players in their game. That subscription also unlocks features like dynamic lighting and the ability to transfer characters between games. For $10 per month ($100 annually if you pay upfront), you can also copy other materials between games, unlock additional customization options and get a monthly reward.

Roll20 is a good middle ground between the other tools we tested. It’s not quite as slick as D&D Beyond, but it offers more features like interactive maps, and it works with other game systems. It’s not quite as robust as Fantasy Grounds, but it’s generally easier to pick up and use. If you want a tool that lets you run a whole tabletop RPG virtually, and you’re less interested in learning how to customize or automate your gameplay, try Roll20.

See at Roll20

SmiteWorks

Fantasy Grounds

Best for ultimate control and automation

Likes

  • Takes care of rules so you can focus on play
  • Enables homebrew content
  • One-time purchase option

Dislikes

  • Steep learning curve just to get started
  • Less beginner-friendly than other services

Fantasy Grounds is a powerful but complex tool that requires a lot of work upfront to be able to get the most out of the service. It allows the most customization of the tools we reviewed, but it also took the longest to get started. If you want a tool that’s easy to pick up and get started with, you’re better off with D&D Beyond or Roll20, but if you want ultimate control over your session and want something that will handle most of the rules for you, Fantasy Grounds is the most complete option we tested.

Before we get into the good parts of Fantasy Grounds, it’s important to understand the barrier to entry. Fantasy Grounds is not intuitive or beginner-friendly. It does offer video guides to help you get started, but you’ll need to spend about an hour just watching those to get a handle on the barest basics. Even after watching the tutorial, it was sometimes a struggle to operate the system’s mechanics. It also seems designed for a desktop setup — we had a hard time navigating the very small menu options on a laptop trackpad, which wasn’t a problem with the other services. Even with guides, Fantasy Grounds was sometimes frustrating to learn how to use.

The flip side of that coin is that Fantasy Grounds is astoundingly robust. It knows that some D&D players want to control every detail of their sessions. Just like the other tools we reviewed, Fantasy Grounds lets you build a digital character sheet. And like Roll20, it lets you use digital maps for combat and exploration. But Fantasy Grounds gives you the tools to customize your entire campaign in more ways than the other tools we tested. 

Perhaps more importantly, Fantasy Grounds understands the rules of a system and will automatically apply them. If a player clicks an enemy on the map and chooses the weapon they want to attack with, Fantasy Grounds will roll a d20, add the appropriate attack roll modifier, then compare that to the enemy’s armor class and tell you whether the attack hits or misses. Other online D&D tools will do individual pieces of that (like adding the appropriate modifier to your attack roll), but won’t compare that to the enemy’s AC and translate it into a hit or miss. Once you’re up and running, Fantasy Grounds allows your play group to spend less time doing math or looking up rules and more time just playing the game.

Fantasy Grounds uses similar subscription pricing to the other services. Players can create free accounts with limited functionality. Or you can pay $4 per month for a standard subscription that lets you play with other people who have a Fantasy Grounds subscription. You also have the option of an ultimate subscription for $10 per month, which allows you to host a campaign for players on free accounts and share content with them. That makes it a little more expensive than other services for DMs who want to share content with players on free accounts. Uniquely, Fantasy Grounds also offers one-time payment options: $39 for a standard license and $149 for an ultimate license. Players on standard or ultimate subscriptions or licenses will be able to purchase sourcebooks for their campaigns, and just like Roll20, Fantasy Grounds allows you to play multiple tabletop RPG systems in addition to D&D. 

Fantasy Grounds is best suited for detail-oriented dungeon masters who want to be able to fine-tune every aspect of their campaign and their players’ experience. If you like to create your own campaign (aka «homebrew») or let your players run customized classes, you’ll have an easier time doing that in Fantasy Grounds than Roll20. D&D Beyond is also pretty capable with homebrew content, but again, it doesn’t offer a maps feature. 

See at Fantasy Grounds

Online D&D FAQs

What do I need to play D&D online?

You can play Dungeons & Dragons online without investing in tools or game services. All you really need are a group of people to play with, an internet connection and a copy of the basic rules, which are available for free from Wizards of the Coast. Those three things are enough for you to run a basic session. The appeal of online D&D tools is the way they help you organize and automate the game. For example, D&D Beyond’s character sheets will automatically tally your proficiency bonus, your ability modifiers and your items’ stats and will calculate everything for you whenever you need to roll for something. Without those tools, you have to manually keep track of bonuses and add them to the appropriate rolls. D&D Beyond lets you sign up for a free account and start making character sheets if you want to try out the game without investing money into it. Roll20 and Fantasy grounds also offer free accounts, but it’s not as easy to start making characters with those accounts.

What are the best D&D map makers?

There are dozens of online tools to help you build a map for your Dungeons & Dragons campaign. However, of the services we tested, only Roll20 and Fantasy Grounds feature interactive maps. Both allow you to use maps from official Dungeons & Dragons adventures or make your own custom maps. You’ll be able to place player characters and enemies across the map to let your players visualize exploration and combat. Roll20’s map system was easier to use, but Fantasy Grounds had more features.

Which D&D service is best?

We tested three Dungeons & Dragons tools and found that each one had its own particular strengths and drawbacks. Roll20 might be the best option if you want a single solution for all your online RPG adventures. D&D Beyond has excellent digital character sheets and resources for beginners. Fantasy Grounds is the most powerful tool overall, but requires substantially more time to learn and set up than the other two. You can also mix and match — making character sheets in D&D Beyond, but using Roll20 for any combat encounters, for example. We recommend creating free accounts with different services to find out what you like or dislike and choose what works best for you.

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Technologies

I’ve Seen It With My Own Eyes: The Robots Are Here and Walking Among Us

The «physical AI» boom has created a world of opportunity for robot makers, and they’re not holding back.

It’s been 24 years since CNET first published an article with the headline The robots are coming. It’s a phrase I’ve repeated in my own writing over the years — mostly in jest. But now in 2026, for the first time, I feel confident in declaring that the robots have finally arrived.

I kicked off this year, as I often do, wandering the halls of the Las Vegas Convention Center and its hotel-based outposts on the lookout for the technology set to define the next 12 months. CES has always been a hotbed of activity for robots, but more often than not, a robot that makes a flashy Vegas debut doesn’t go on to have a rich, meaningful career in the wider world.

In fact, as cute as they often are and as fun as they can be to interact with on the show floor, most robots I’ve seen at CES over the years amount to little more than gimmicks. They either come back year after year with no notable improvements or are never seen or heard from again.

In more than a decade of covering the show, I’ve been waiting for a shift to occur. In 2026, I finally witnessed it. From Hyundai unveiling the final product version of the Boston Dynamics Atlas humanoid robot in its press conference to Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang’s focus on «physical AI» during his keynote, a sea change was evident this year in how people were talking about robots.

«We’ve had this dream of having robots everywhere for decades and decades,» Rev Lebaredian, Nvidia’s vice president of Omniverse and simulation told me on the sidelines of the chipmaker’s vast exhibition at the glamorous Fontainebleau Hotel. «It’s been in sci-fi as long as we can remember.» 

Throughout the show, I felt like I was watching that sci-fi vision come to life. Everywhere I went, I was stumbling upon robot demos (some of which will be entering the market this year) drawing crowds, like the people lining up outside Hyundai’s booth to see the new Atlas in action.

So what’s changed? Until now, «we didn’t have the technology to create the brain of a robot,» Lebaredian said.

AI has unlocked our ability to apply algorithms to language, and it’s being applied to the physical world, changing everything for robots and those who make them.

The physical AI revolution

What truly makes a robot a robot? Rewind to CES 2017: I spent my time at the show asking every robotics expert that question, sparked by the proliferation of autonomous vehicles, drones and intelligent smart home devices.

This exercise predated the emergence of generative AI and models such as OpenAI’s ChatGPT, but already I could see that by integrating voice assistants into their products, companies were beginning to blur the boundaries of what could be considered robotics.

Not only has the tech evolved since that time, but so has the language we use to talk about it. At CES 2026, the main topic of conversation seemed to be «physical AI.» It’s an umbrella term that can encompass everything from self-driving cars to robots.

«If you have any physical embodiments, where AI is not only used to perceive the environment, but actually to take decisions and actions that interact with the environment around it … then it’s physical AI,» Ahmed Sadek, head of physical AI and vice president of engineering at chipmaker Qualcomm told me.

Autonomous vehicles have been the easiest expression of physical AI to build so far, according to Lebaredian, simply because their main challenge is to dodge objects rather than interact with them. «Avoiding touching things is a lot easier than manipulating things,» he said.

Still, the development of self-driving vehicles has done much of the heavy lifting on the hardware, setting the stage for robot development to accelerate at a rapid pace now that the software required to build a brain is catching up.

For Nvidia, which worked on the new Atlas robot with Boston Dynamics, and Qualcomm, which announced its latest robotics platform at CES, these developments present a huge opportunity. 

But that opportunity also extends to start-ups. Featured prominently at the CES 2026 booth of German automotive company Schaeffler was the year-and-a-half-old British company Humanoid, demonstrating the capabilities of its robot HMND 01.

The wheeled robot was built in just seven months Artem Sokolov, Humanoid’s CEO, told me, as we watch it sort car parts with its pincerlike hands. «We built our bipedal one for service and household much faster — in five months,» Sokolov added.

Humanoid’s speed can be accounted for by the AI boom plus an influx of talent recruited from top robotics companies, said Sokolov. The company has already signed around 25,000 preorders for HMND 01 and completed pilots with six Fortune 500 companies, he said.

This momentum extends to the next generation of Humanoid’s robots, where Sokolov doesn’t foresee any real bottlenecks. The main factors dictating the pace will be improvements in AI models and making the hardware more reliable and cost effective.

Humanoid hype hits its peak

Humanoid the company might have the rights to the name, but the concept of humanoids is a wider domain. 

By the end of last year, the commercialization of humanoid robots had entered an «explosive phase of growth,» with a 508% year-on-year increase in global market revenue to $440 million, according to a report released by IDC this month.

At CES, Qualcomm’s robot demonstration showed how its latest platform could be adapted across different forms, including a robotic arm that could assemble a sandwich. But it was the humanoids at its booth that caused everyone to pull out their phones and start filming.

«Our vision is that if you have any embodiment, any mechatronic system, our platform should be able to transform it to a continuously learning intelligent robot,» said Qualcomm’s Sadek. But, he added, the major benefit of the humanoid form is its «flexibility.»

Some in the robotics world have criticized the focus on humanoids, due to their replication of our own limitations. It’s a notion that Lebaredian disagrees with, pointing out that we’ve designed our world around us and that robots need to be able to operate within it.

«There are many tasks that are dull, dangerous and dirty — they call it the three Ds — that are being done by humans today, that we have labor shortages for and that this technology can potentially go help us with,» he said.

We already have many specialist robots working in factories around the world, Lebaredian added. With their combination of arms, legs and mobility, humanoids are «largely a superset of all of the other kinds of robots» and, as such, are perfect for the more general-purpose work we need help with.

The hype around robots — and humanoids in particular — at CES this year felt intense. Even Boston Dynamics CEO Robert Playter acknowledged this in a Q&A with reporters moments after he unveiled the new Atlas on stage.

But it’s not just hype, Playter insisted, because Boston Dynamics is already demonstrating that they can put thousands of robots in the market. «That is not an indication of a hype cycle, but actually an indication of an emerging industry,» he said.

A huge amount of money is being poured into a rapidly growing number of robotics start-ups. The rate of this investment is a signal that the tech is ready to go, according to Nvidia’s Lebaredian.

«It’s because, fundamentally, the experts, people who understand this stuff, now believe, technically, it’s all possible,» he said. «We’ve switched from a scientific problem of discovery to an engineering problem.»

Robot evolution: From industry to home

From what I observed at the show, this engineering «problem» is one that many companies have already solved. Robots such as Atlas and HMND 01 have crossed the threshold from prototype to factory ready. The question for many of us will be as to when will these robots be ready for our homes.

Playter has openly talked about Boston Dynamics’ ambitions in this regard. He sees Atlas evolving into a home robot — but not yet. Some newer entrants to the robotics market — 1X, Sunday Robotics and Humanoid among them — are keen to get their robots into people’s homes in the next couple of years. Playter cautions against this approach.

«Companies are advertising that they want to go right to the home,» he said. «We think that’s the wrong strategy.»

The reasons he listed are twofold: pricing and safety. Playter echoed a sentiment I’ve heard elsewhere: that the first real use for home humanoid robots will be to carry out care duties for disabled and elderly populations. Perhaps in 20 years, you will have a robot carry you in and out of bed, but relying on one to do so when you’re in a vulnerable state poses «critical safety issue,» he said.

Putting robots in factories first allows people to work closely with them while keeping a safe distance, allowing those safety kinks to be ironed out. The deployment of robots at scale in industrial settings will also lead to mass manufacturing of components that will, at some point, make robots affordable for the rest of us, said Playter (unlike 1X’s $20,000 Neo robot, for example).

Still, he imagines the business model will be «robots as a service,» even when they do first enter our homes. Elder care itself is a big industry with real money being spent that could present Boston Dynamics with a market opportunity as Atlas takes its first steps beyond the factory floor.

«I spent a lot of money … with my mom in specialty care the last few years,» he said. «Having robots that can preserve autonomy and dignity at home, I think people will actually spend money — maybe $20K a year.»

The first «care» robots are more likely to be companion robots. This year at the CES, Tombot announced that its robotic labrador, Jennie, who first charmed me back at the show in 2020, is finally ready to go on sale. It served as yet another signal to me that the robots are ready to lead lives beyond the convention center walls.

Unlike in previous years, I left Vegas confident that I’ll be seeing more of this year’s cohort of CES robots in the future. Maybe not in my home just yet, but it’s time to prepare for a world in which robots will increasingly walk among us.

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Technologies

Today’s Wordle Hints, Answer and Help for Jan. 29, #1685

Here are hints and the answer for today’s Wordle for Jan. 29, No. 1,685.

Looking for the most recent Wordle answer? Click here for today’s Wordle hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Connections, Connections: Sports Edition and Strands puzzles.

Today’s Wordle puzzle was a tough one for me. I never seem to guess three of the letters in this word. If you need a new starter word, check out our list of which letters show up the most in English words. If you need hints and the answer, read on.

Read more: New Study Reveals Wordle’s Top 10 Toughest Words of 2025

Today’s Wordle hints

Before we show you today’s Wordle answer, we’ll give you some hints. If you don’t want a spoiler, look away now.

Wordle hint No. 1: Repeats

Today’s Wordle answer has no repeated letters.

Wordle hint No. 2: Vowels

Today’s Wordle answer has one vowel and one sometimes vowel.

Wordle hint No. 3: First letter

Today’s Wordle answer begins with F.

Wordle hint No. 4: Last letter

Today’s Wordle answer ends with Y.

Wordle hint No. 5: Meaning

Today’s Wordle answer can refer to a pastry that breaks apart easily.

TODAY’S WORDLE ANSWER

Today’s Wordle answer is FLAKY.

Yesterday’s Wordle answer

Yesterday’s Wordle answer, Jan. 28, No. 1684 was CRUEL.

Recent Wordle answers

Jan. 24, No. 1680: CLIFF

Jan. 25, No. 1681: STRUT

Jan. 26, No. 1682: FREAK

Jan. 27, No. 1683: DUSKY

Don’t miss any of our unbiased tech content and lab-based reviews. Add CNET as a preferred Google source.

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Technologies

Today’s NYT Strands Hints, Answers and Help for Jan. 29 #697

Here are hints and answers for the NYT Strands puzzle for Jan. 29, No. 697.

Looking for the most recent Strands answer? Click here for our daily Strands hints, as well as our daily answers and hints for The New York Times Mini Crossword, Wordle, Connections and Connections: Sports Edition puzzles.

Today’s NYT Strands puzzle is a bit of a puzzler until you realize the theme. Some of the answers are difficult to unscramble, so if you need hints and answers, read on.

I go into depth about the rules for Strands in this story. 

If you’re looking for today’s Wordle, Connections and Mini Crossword answers, you can visit CNET’s NYT puzzle hints page.

Read more: NYT Connections Turns 1: These Are the 5 Toughest Puzzles So Far

Hint for today’s Strands puzzle

Today’s Strands theme is: Talk of the town.

If that doesn’t help you, here’s a clue: What a legend.

Clue words to unlock in-game hints

Your goal is to find hidden words that fit the puzzle’s theme. If you’re stuck, find any words you can. Every time you find three words of four letters or more, Strands will reveal one of the theme words. These are the words I used to get those hints but any words of four or more letters that you find will work:

  • ROIL, CLAIM, RARE, HELP, PEAR, PEARS, MORE, COIN, SPEAR, SPEARS

Answers for today’s Strands puzzle

These are the answers that tie into the theme. The goal of the puzzle is to find them all, including the spangram, a theme word that reaches from one side of the puzzle to the other. When you have all of them (I originally thought there were always eight but learned that the number can vary), every letter on the board will be used. Here are the nonspangram answers:

  • HERO, ICON, CELEBRITY, SUPERSTAR, PERSONALITY

Today’s Strands spangram

Today’s Strands spangram is CLAIMTOFAME. To find it, start with the C that’s four letters to the right on the very top row, and wind down.

Don’t miss any of our unbiased tech content and lab-based reviews. Add CNET as a preferred Google source.

Toughest Strands puzzles

Here are some of the Strands topics I’ve found to be the toughest.

#1: Dated slang. Maybe you didn’t even use this lingo when it was cool. Toughest word: PHAT.

#2: Thar she blows! I guess marine biologists might ace this one. Toughest word: BALEEN or RIGHT. 

#3: Off the hook. Again, it helps to know a lot about sea creatures. Sorry, Charlie. Toughest word: BIGEYE or SKIPJACK.

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