The Objective
The goal of chess is to checkmate the opponent's king — to place it under direct attack (in check) from which it cannot escape. Every decision over the board, whether it concerns material, position, or time, ultimately serves this aim. Chess is not won by capturing the most pieces; it is won by making the king inescapable.
The game is played on an 8×8 board of 64 alternating light and dark squares. Each player begins with 16 pieces: one king, one queen, two rooks, two bishops, two knights, and eight pawns. White always moves first. Players alternate turns, and a turn consists of moving exactly one piece (or, in the case of castling, two pieces simultaneously by special rule).
How Each Piece Moves
Understanding piece movement is the foundation of all chess knowledge. See our fuller treatment in the how to play chess guide; the essential rules are as follows.
- King: Moves exactly one square in any direction — horizontally, vertically, or diagonally. The king may never move into a square that is attacked by an enemy piece.
- Queen: The most powerful piece. Moves any number of squares along a rank, file, or diagonal, provided no piece blocks its path.
- Rook: Moves any number of squares horizontally or vertically. Rooks become powerful when placed on open files with no pawns blocking them.
- Bishop: Moves any number of squares diagonally. Each bishop is permanently confined to squares of one colour — one light-squared bishop and one dark-squared bishop per player.
- Knight: Moves in an L-shape — two squares in one direction and then one square perpendicular, or vice versa. The knight is the only piece that can jump over other pieces.
- Pawn: Moves forward one square, or two squares on its first move from its starting rank. Pawns capture diagonally forward one square. Pawns cannot move backwards under any circumstances.
A piece captures by moving to a square occupied by an opponent's piece, which is then removed from the board. Pieces cannot move through other pieces (except the knight) or occupy a square held by a friendly piece.
Special Moves
Castling
Castling is the one move in chess where two pieces move simultaneously. The king shifts two squares towards a rook on its own starting rank, and that rook jumps over to the square the king crossed. Castling is legal only when all of the following conditions are met:
- Neither the king nor the rook in question has previously moved in the game.
- There are no pieces between the king and rook.
- The king is not currently in check.
- The king does not pass through a square that is under attack.
- The king does not land on a square that is under attack.
Castling is described as kingside (short) when the king moves toward the rook on its right, and queenside (long) toward the rook on its left. It is one of the most important moves in the opening, as it simultaneously activates the rook and places the king behind a wall of pawns.
En Passant
En passant (French: "in passing") is a pawn capture that arises in a specific situation. When a pawn advances two squares from its starting rank and lands immediately beside an opponent's pawn, the opponent may capture it as though it had moved only one square — the capturing pawn moves diagonally to the square the enemy pawn skipped, and the enemy pawn is removed. This capture must be made immediately on the very next move. If the option is not taken then, the right is permanently lost. En passant exists because the two-square pawn advance was introduced to speed up the opening; en passant prevents a pawn from using that advance to evade a waiting capture.
Pawn Promotion
When a pawn reaches the far end of the board — the opponent's back rank — it must be promoted. Promotion is not optional. The pawn is replaced immediately by a queen, rook, bishop, or knight of the same colour, the player's choice. Promotion to a queen is almost always best (since the queen is the strongest piece), but promotion to a knight — called underpromotion — is occasionally the only winning move. A player may have multiple queens on the board simultaneously through promotion.
Check
A king is in check when it is under direct attack from one or more enemy pieces. When in check, a player must resolve the check immediately — no other move is legal. There are exactly three ways to escape check:
- Move the king to a square where it is not under attack.
- Block the check by interposing a friendly piece between the attacking piece and the king (only possible when the attack comes from a sliding piece — queen, rook, or bishop — that is not adjacent to the king).
- Capture the attacking piece with any friendly piece.
If none of these three remedies is available, the position is checkmate and the game is over.
Checkmate
Checkmate ends the game immediately in a victory for the attacking player. It occurs when a king is in check and has no legal move to escape. The king is never actually captured — the moment checkmate is reached, the game stops. In chess tactics, recognising checkmate patterns — back-rank mates, smothered mates, scholar's mates — is a core skill at every level of play.
Stalemate
Stalemate is one of the most important rules to understand, and one of the most common sources of confusion for newer players. Stalemate occurs when the player to move is not in check but has no legal move available. The result is an immediate draw — not a win for the player who engineered the position. This distinction from checkmate is critical: in checkmate, the king is in check; in stalemate, the king is not in check. A losing player may deliberately sacrifice material to create a stalemate position and rescue a half-point from a lost game.
Draw Conditions
A game of chess can end as a draw through several mechanisms:
- Agreement: Either player may offer a draw at any point during their own turn. If the opponent accepts, the game is drawn immediately.
- Threefold repetition: If the same position occurs three times with the same player to move and the same castling and en passant rights, the player to move may claim a draw. The three occurrences need not be consecutive.
- Fifty-move rule: If 50 consecutive moves are made by each player without a pawn move or a capture, either player may claim a draw. Pawn moves and captures reset the counter.
- Insufficient material: If neither player has sufficient pieces to deliver checkmate — for example, king versus king, or king and bishop versus king — the game is drawn immediately.
- Stalemate: As described above.
The Touch-Move Rule
In over-the-board play governed by FIDE rules, if a player intentionally touches one of their own pieces, they must move that piece if a legal move exists. If a player intentionally touches an opponent's piece, they must capture it if a legal capture exists. If a player touches their king and a rook simultaneously with the intention of castling, they must castle if it is legal. The rule prevents players from picking up pieces to calculate variations. Online chess has no touch-move rule, as no physical contact occurs.
Illegal Moves
Under FIDE regulations, making an illegal move — such as moving a pinned piece that would expose the king to check — is penalised. In tournament play, a player who makes an illegal move must retract it and make a legal move with the same piece if possible; a time penalty is also imposed. A player who makes a second illegal move in the same game forfeits the game. In casual play, illegal moves are simply taken back by agreement.
FIDE and the Staunton Pattern
The Federation Internationale des Echecs (FIDE), chess's governing body, mandates that pieces used in official tournaments conform to the Staunton pattern — the design created by Jaques of London in 1849. FIDE's rules specify minimum and maximum piece heights, the ratio of king height to base diameter, and the requirement that pieces be clearly distinguishable by shape alone. The Staunton design — with its distinctive crowned king, cross-topped bishop, horse-head knight, and clean tower rook — has been the universal standard for official play for over 175 years precisely because it optimises legibility, stability, and manufacturing consistency. For players seeking a set that meets FIDE specifications, tournament-grade Staunton chess sets are the correct choice.
Jaques of London — Making Chess Sets Since 1849
The rules of chess have been codified and standardised in no small part because of the Staunton chess set, which Jaques of London designed and patented in 1849. Before the Staunton pattern, chess pieces varied wildly between regions and manufacturers, making international competition impractical. Howard Staunton, England's leading player of the era, endorsed the Jaques design, and within a decade it had been adopted across Europe as the universal tournament standard — a status FIDE made official in the twentieth century and which holds to this day. Every set Jaques produces is built to that original specification: pieces weighted and felted for proper handling, proportions held to the ratios that make play comfortable over a long session, crafted from the same tradition that produced the first authoritative set in 1849.
Shop Staunton Chess Sets →Frequently Asked Questions
Q: What are the rules of chess?
Chess is a two-player strategy game played on an 8×8 board, with each player controlling 16 pieces. The objective is to checkmate the opponent's king — placing it under attack with no legal escape. Players alternate moves, beginning with White. The six piece types each move differently: the queen is the most powerful, moving in any direction any number of squares; the king moves one square in any direction; rooks move horizontally or vertically; bishops move diagonally; knights jump in an L-shape and can leap over pieces; and pawns advance forward and capture diagonally. Special moves include castling, en passant, and pawn promotion. The game ends by checkmate, stalemate (a draw), or one of several other draw conditions including threefold repetition and the fifty-move rule.
Q: What is the difference between checkmate and stalemate?
The difference comes down to whether the king is in check. In checkmate, the king is under direct attack and has no legal move to escape — the player who delivered the check wins the game immediately. In stalemate, the player to move is not in check but has no legal move available — the game is drawn immediately, with no winner. Stalemate is a saving resource for the losing side in many endgames: a player who is losing significant material may try to arrange a position where the opponent inadvertently removes all legal moves, converting a loss into a draw. Recognising the difference is essential for accurate endgame play.
Q: What is the en passant rule?
En passant ("in passing" in French) is a special pawn capture. When an opponent's pawn uses its optional two-square advance from its starting rank and lands beside your pawn, you have the right to capture it on your very next move as though it had only moved one square — your pawn moves diagonally to the square the opponent's pawn passed through, and the opponent's pawn is removed from the board. Crucially, this right exists only for one move: if you do not capture en passant immediately, the opportunity is gone permanently. The rule was introduced alongside the two-square pawn advance to prevent a pawn from bypassing a capture it could not have evaded had it moved only one square.
Q: Can a pawn move backwards?
No. A pawn can never move backwards under any rule or circumstance in chess. Pawns always advance toward the opponent's side of the board — one square per move, or two squares on the pawn's first move. This makes pawn moves the only truly irreversible decisions in chess: once a pawn advances, it cannot retreat. This is why experienced players consider pawn moves carefully before making them, since each advance permanently alters the pawn structure. A pawn that reaches the opponent's back rank is promoted to another piece, but it still cannot move backwards — it simply becomes a different piece entirely.