How to Play Chess

The Chess Board

The game of chess is played by two opponents moving pieces on a square board called a chessboard.

The chessboard is composed of an 8 x 8 grid of 64 squares, 32 light squares and 32 dark squares. In tournament play the dark squares are often green.

The 8 vertical rows of squares are called files.

The 8 horizontal rows of squares are called ranks.

The lines of squares of the same color, touching only at their corners, and running in a straight line from one edge of the board to another, are called diagonals (see Figure 1).

Each square has a unique name. For example, a1, h1, d4, e5, h8, and a8. The square name always starts with a lowercase letter (a-h), and ends with a number (1-8). To find the name of a square, from that square follow the file out to the edge to get the letter. Next do the same for the rank to get the number. For example this is the c4-square (see Figure 2).

The chessboard is placed between the players in such a way that the nearest corner square to the right of the player is a light colored square. If you are playing the White side that light colored corner square closest to you would be the h1 square. If you are playing the Black side that light colored corner square closest to you would be the a8 square.

There are two long diagonals on the chessboard. One dark square diagonal, and one light square diagonal. The long dark square diagonal runs from the a1-square to the h8-square. The long light square diagonal runs from a8-h1 (see Figure 3).

Chess Pieces

At the start of a chess game there are 32 pieces on the board. 16 White pieces and 16 Black pieces. Each side has a king, 1 queen, 2 rooks, 2 bishops, 2 knights, and 8 pawns. The queen and rooks are called major pieces. The bishops and knights are called minor pieces.

Because the king is a little complicated, we will save it for last. In the next section we will discuss the Queen.