How to Play Chess
Chess is the world's most famous strategy game: sixteen pieces each, sixty-four squares and one goal — trap the enemy king. This beginner's guide explains how every piece moves, the special rules like castling and en passant, and the principles that win games.
By the Multiplayer Games team · Updated · Rules checked against the sources below
Objective
Checkmate your opponent's king: attack it so that it cannot escape capture.
Setup
White's pieces fill the first two ranks, Black's the last two, with each queen on its own colour. White always moves first.
Chess rules, step by step
- Pawns. Move one square forward (two on their first move) and capture one square diagonally forward.
- Knights, bishops, rooks. Knights jump in an L-shape over other pieces. Bishops move any distance diagonally; rooks any distance in straight lines.
- Queen and king. The queen combines rook and bishop moves. The king moves one square in any direction and can never move into check.
- Check. When your king is attacked you must get out of check — by moving, blocking or capturing the attacker.
- Special moves. Castle by moving the king two squares towards a rook that hasn't moved. Capture en passant right after an enemy pawn jumps two squares past yours. Promote a pawn that reaches the far side — usually to a queen.
- End of the game. Checkmate wins. Stalemate (no legal move but not in check), threefold repetition, insufficient material or fifty moves without a capture or pawn move are draws.
Chess variants, and the rules we use
Chess is played slightly differently from place to place. These are the variants you're most likely to meet:
- Blitz and bullet. The same rules with very short time controls — 3 to 5 minutes, or 1 minute, a side.
- Chess960 (Fischer Random). The back-rank pieces are shuffled so memorised openings don't help.
- Correspondence. Days per move — much like our take-turns mode.
How Chess works in Multiplayer Games:
- Full FIDE movement rules: castling, en passant and promotion.
- Draws by stalemate, threefold repetition and the 50-move rule are detected automatically.
- No clock — play live or take turns over the day.
- In tournaments, who plays White alternates each game.
Chess strategy for beginners
- Control the centre in the opening with your pawns and pieces.
- Develop knights and bishops before moving the same piece twice.
- Castle early to tuck your king away and connect your rooks.
- Before every move, check what your opponent is threatening — then check again.
- Trade pieces when you're ahead in material; avoid trades when you're behind.
Common mistakes to avoid
- Bringing the queen out too early, where it gets chased around.
- Leaving pieces undefended ('hanging').
- Grabbing pawns while your king is still in the centre.
Chess terms explained
- Check
- The king is under attack and must get out of it.
- Checkmate
- Check with no legal escape — the game is over.
- Stalemate
- No legal move but not in check — a draw.
- Castling
- King moves two squares towards a rook, which jumps over it.
- En passant
- A pawn captures an enemy pawn that just moved two squares past it.
- Promotion
- A pawn reaching the last rank becomes a queen, rook, bishop or knight.
A short history of Chess
Chess descends from chaturanga, played in India around the 6th century. It spread to Persia as shatranj and then through the Islamic world to Europe. The modern, far more powerful queen and bishop appeared in Spain and Italy in the late 15th century, creating the fast game we play today.
The international federation FIDE was founded in 1924 and publishes the official Laws of Chess. In 1997 IBM's Deep Blue beat world champion Garry Kasparov, and today the game is more popular than ever online.
Chess FAQ
Sources
We checked these rules against:
