Chess Terms: A Complete Guide
The world of chess has its own language. For enthusiasts, players, and newcomers, learning the meaning of chess terms is one way to enhance your enjoyment of the game.
In this guide, you can find a complete list of the most essential chess terms. With these concise definitions, you can quickly grasp useful chess concepts, rules, and ideas.
The Stages of the Game
Chess games have three stages: the opening, the middlegame, and the endgame. While the stages are not absolute divisions, they do provide useful distinctions and represent key categories in chess theory.
Opening: The initial stage of the game (usually 10 to 15 moves). Players often learn a specific series of moves (openings), which generally aim to take control of the central squares, develop the pieces, and protect the king. Opening moves established in chess theory are sometimes referred to as book moves.
Middlegame: The stage of the game after a player has developed most or all of their pieces. The middlegame is characterized by exchanges, complex calculations, and tensions in a position.
Endgame: When most of the pieces have been traded off. There is no exact set of positions, but usually, the queens have been exchanged, the kings are more active, and most of the other pieces have been traded or captured. Endgames involve active kings, pawn pushes, promotions, and the conclusion of the game.
Chess Rules Terms
Over its long history, chess has accrued a long list of rules and conventions. Here are some terms related to the game’s many regulations.
Check: The king is attacked by a piece and must move, be defended, or the attacking piece must be captured.
Checkmate: One way to win a game of chess. To put your opponent in checkmate, you must check their king so that it has no possible move to escape or capture the attacking piece.
Stalemate: One way to draw a chess game. It occurs when a player is not in check but cannot legally move any of their pieces.
Threefold Repetition: Another way to draw a chess game. When players reach the exact same position three times, they may claim a draw. This happens automatically on online platforms.
Insufficient Material: Games can also be drawn when neither player has sufficient material to checkmate the other. For example, only a king and a bishop. Necessarily, the game ends in a draw.
Fifty-Move Rule: A much less common way to draw a game is via the fifty-move rule. This rule states that if neither player makes a capture or pawn move for fifty moves, players can claim a draw.
Castling: The most well-known special move in chess. It involves moving the king to one side of the back rank and bringing a rook to the center of the back rank. Kingside or short castling refers to moving the king two squares from its starting position to g1 for white and g8 for black. Queenside or long castling goes the other way: c1 for white and c8 for black.
Pawn Promotion: When a pawn reaches the other end of the board, it may promote to a bishop, knight, rook, or queen.
Under Promotion: Naturally, the most common choice is to promote to a queen. However, in certain scenarios, it may be more beneficial to under-promote to a bishop, knight, or rook.
En Passant: Another special move in chess. It refers to the ability to capture a pawn that moves two squares past your pawn.
Touch-Move Rule: Enforced in some tournaments, the touch-move rule states that once you have touched a piece, you must move it (providing it has a legal move). If you wish to adjust a piece, you must announce it.
J'adoube: This means “I adjust” in French. Players use this phrase to announce that they are adjusting pieces to avoid violating the touch rules.
Further reading: Rules of Chess: 10 to Know Before Your Next Tournament
Types of Chess
Chess comes in various forms, with different time controls, variants, and formats. Here are some relevant terms.
Bullet Chess: The fastest time control in chess, bullet games have less than 3 minutes in total for each player. Common bullet time controls are 1 minute each (1 | 0) or 1 minute with 1-second increments added after each move (1 | 1).
Blitz Chess: Blitz games have time controls of at least 3 minutes and less than 10 minutes for each player. For example, 3 minutes each (3 | 0) or 3 minutes and 2-second increments (3 | 2).
Rapid Chess: Rapid games have more than 10 minutes and less than 60 minutes for each player. Common rapid chess time controls include 10 minutes for each player (10 | 0) or 15 minutes and 10-second increments (10 | 15).
Classical Chess: Most prestigious chess tournaments use the longer classical form. For example, they will allot players 90 minutes for the first 40 moves and 30 minutes for the rest of the game.
Over-the-board: This refers to an in-person game using a physical chess set as opposed to online or correspondence games.
Correspondence chess: Less common today, this refers to playing a game of chess via letters.
Chess Variant: A form of chess with different rules. For example, Chess960 randomizes the starting positions.
Time Control Words
Outside of casual games, chess is usually played with a time control. This simply means that each player has a certain amount of time to make all their moves, and running out loses the game.
Increment: This is a small amount of time players receive after every move. Common increments are one second, two seconds, and five seconds.
Flag: To run out of time and lose the game. Flagging your opponent refers to forcing your opponent to run out of time by making fast moves.
Time Odds: Time odds are a type of handicap in which a stronger opponent gives a weaker one more time to make their moves.
Related: Chess Time: Chess Clock Rules & How They Affect Strategy
Online and Computer Chess Words
Today, millions of chess games are played on a computer. Here are some keywords related to chess in the digital world.
Chess Engine: A computer program designed to play chess.
Premove: A function of online and computer chess that allows you to preset a move or moves before your opponent has made theirs.
Analysis Board: An interface that allows you to evaluate positions, explore variations, and check best moves for a chess game.
Mouseslip: A term for when a player moves a piece by mistake by clicking incorrectly.
Chess Terms for Tactics
Chess tactics are moves or combinations of moves that provide an immediate advantage.
Fork: Attacking two pieces at one time. For example, when a knight attacks a rook and a queen.
Pin: Fixing a piece to its square by attacking the king or a more powerful piece behind it. For example, a bishop may pin a rook to a queen.
Skewer: A skewer refers to when a long-range piece, like a queen, rook, or bishop, attacks a valuable piece, like a king or queen, and forces it to move, revealing an attack on a less valuable piece.
Discovered Attack: Moving a piece and uncovering a hidden attack by another piece, creating dual threats.
Battery: A coordinated set of pieces lined up to attack a specific square, often near the castled king.
Double Check: A powerful tactic in which the king is put in check by two different pieces at once. For example, if a knight moves out of the way of an attacking Bishop and also checks the king. The bishop and the knight create a double attack on the king, and the attacking pieces cannot be taken, so the king must move.
Gambit: An opening or move in which a player offers a pawn to be taken to gain a different kind of advantage, like faster development.
Positional Chess Terms
Advantages in chess that don't come down to material are based on the merits of your position. Here are some terms we use to talk about chess positions.
Active Piece: A piece with many possible squares it can move to. It controls or attacks those squares. An example is a so-called octopus knight, which is a centralized knight that attacks eight squares.
Pawn Structure: The branch of chess theory dealing with the arrangement of pawns.
Isolated pawns: Pawns that are not connected to or protected by any other pawns.
Backwards pawns: Pawns that cannot advance without being captured. They are unprotected by other pawns and naturally vulnerable.
King Safety: The king is the most valuable piece on the board and must be protected throughout the game. This idea of guarding it from attacks and evaluating threats is king safety.
Outpost: A square on your opponent’s side of the board, protected by a pawn, and occupied by a knight or bishop.
Fianchettoed Bishop: A bishop that develops behind an advanced pawn on the b2, g2, b7, or g7, often as part of a hypermodern opening.
Closed Position: Occurs when the centre of the board is occupied by pawns, limiting the mobility of pieces.
Open Position: This occurs when there are fewer pawns in the center (often due to them having been traded off), allowing for more active pieces.
Chess Concepts
These are some terms that refer to fundamental and complex ideas in chess.
Exchange: Trading a piece for another of a similar value. For example, trading a knight for a bishop or another knight.
Hanging Piece: An unprotected piece that your opponent can capture.
Initiative: Being on the offensive or having the opportunity to launch an attack. By creating threats and having a stronger structure, you are forcing your opponent to play defensively.
Counterplay: If your opponent is creating an attack, counterplay is your attempt to create threats of your own.
Opposition: When two kings face each other, they cannot encroach into the immediate squares between them. Opposition is important in endgames when one player is attempting to advance pawns and the other is attempting to prevent them.
Tempo: The idea that each move is like a unit of time. By making moves that do multiple things at once and forcing your opponent to waste moves or time, you can gain tempo.
Zugzwang: Positions in which a player must make a bad move because they have no good options. This usually occurs in the endgame when there are limited pieces on the board. A common example is when a player aiming to promote a pawn forces the opponent's king out of the way using opposition.
Prophylaxis: The idea that you can gain an advantage by limiting your opponent's possible moves. In practice, it means protecting key squares so your opponent cannot improve.
Zwischenzug: Also known as intermezzo, this is an unexpected in-between move. Instead of making an expected response, like a recapture, you create another threat that your opponent must address.
Waiting Move: Sometimes you need to force your opponent to make a move without making any major changes to your position. In this situation, you can make a waiting move, the only purpose of which is to force your opponent to move.
Simplification: Trading off pieces to make the position less complicated.
Minority Attack: A specific type of pawn attack in which a small group of pawns attacks a large group to create a weakness (for example, 2 vs 3). The smaller group of pawns can create an isolated or backward pawn, making it vulnerable to threats.
Move Quality Terms
Chess terms are often distinguished by the quality or accuracy of the move.
Inaccuracy: Accuracy in chess is measured by how well a move corresponds to the best engine moves. An inaccuracy is a move that is not one of the good options recommended by a chess engine.
Mistake: A move that gives your opponent an advantage. It may create a weakness in your position, lose a pawn of medium importance, or lose a piece without sufficient compensation.
Blunder: A major mistake in chess that gives your opponent a significant, possibly winning advantage. It could allow them to immediately win the game via checkmate, severely damage your position, or hang a piece.
Brilliancy: An excellent move that is difficult to spot and drastically improves your position. Often, it involves a sacrifice or an unexpected tactical idea.