Chess

🕹️ How to play

1. How to play chess online: White moves first and the players alternate one move each. Checkmate the enemy king to win; if the side to move is not in check but has no legal move, it is stalemate and a draw. The page opens on a two-player board; tap "vs CPU" to play the computer instead.
2. How to move and capture: Tap one of your pieces and every square it can reach lights up — a dot for an empty square, a ring for a piece you can capture. Tap a lit square, or drag the piece there. Tap a square it can't reach and nothing moves; the bar under the board explains why, such as a blocked path or a pinned piece.
3. How to play chess with two players on one device: By default you pass the phone: after every move the board turns so the player to move is at the bottom. If you sit face to face with the phone flat between you, switch Settings to "Face to face" — the board stays put and the far player's pieces and panel turn toward them. Take-backs need the opponent's OK unless you switch that off.
4. How the game ends: Checkmate is stamped in the middle of the board, and the result card shows who won, how, how many moves were played and the material count. Draws say which rule applied — stalemate, threefold repetition, the fifty-move rule or insufficient material — plus one tip to avoid it. Review the game move by move or play again with colours swapped.

📖 Rules & variants

Board and setup: 64 squares, 8×8, with a light square in each player's bottom-right corner. White sets up on ranks 1–2 and Black on ranks 7–8. The back rank runs rook, knight, bishop, queen, king, bishop, knight, rook, with the queen on her own colour; eight pawns fill the second rank. Squares are named by file a–h and rank 1–8, for example e4. White moves first.

How the pieces move: the king moves one square in any direction; the queen any distance straight or diagonally; the rook any distance straight; the bishop any distance diagonally, so it stays on one colour forever; the knight jumps in an L-shape and is the only piece that can jump over others; the pawn moves one square forward, two on its first move, and captures one square diagonally forward. Apart from the knight, no piece can pass through another.

Castling rules: the king moves two squares toward a rook and that rook jumps to the king's other side, counting as one move. All five conditions must hold: the king has never moved; that rook has never moved; the squares between them are empty; the king is not in check; and the squares the king crosses and lands on are not attacked. Here you can tap the king and then the rook (or g1/c1) to castle, and if it is not allowed the page names the condition that fails.

En passant: when an enemy pawn advances two squares from its starting square and lands beside your pawn, your pawn may capture it on the very next move by moving diagonally to the square it skipped. Only that move counts — wait one turn and the right is gone.

Pawn promotion: a pawn that reaches the far rank must become a queen, rook, bishop or knight of the same colour (never a king, never stay a pawn). A queen is usual; a knight sometimes gives check at once, and a rook or bishop can avoid stalemate.

Check, checkmate and stalemate: a move that attacks the king is check, and the player in check must escape immediately by moving the king, capturing the checking piece or blocking the line. If there is no escape it is checkmate and the game is lost. If the side to move is not in check but has no legal move at all, it is stalemate and the game is drawn — the classic trap when you are far ahead.

Draw rules: stalemate; the same position (same player to move, same castling and en passant rights) occurring three times; fifty moves by each side with no capture and no pawn move; insufficient material, such as king against king or king and one bishop or knight against a king; or a draw by agreement. This page applies threefold repetition and the fifty-move rule automatically and warns you one step before; a game also ends drawn at 300 moves.

Beginner tips: fight for the centre with e4 or d4, develop knights and bishops early and castle to tuck your king away. Before every move ask what your opponent can capture and whether your move leaves a piece hanging. Don't bring the queen out too early. When you are winning big, make sure the enemy king still has a legal move so you don't stalemate it.

Three diagrams for the special rules

❓ FAQ