3D Chess

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How to Read Chess Notation

Algebraic notation explained: squares, piece letters, captures, checks, castling and promotion, so you can follow any game or book.

Every chess book, puzzle and broadcast writes moves the same way: in algebraic notation. It looks cryptic at first, but it takes about ten minutes to learn, and once you can read it you can replay any game ever recorded. Our move list in the game uses it too.

Naming the squares

The board is a grid. The eight columns, called files, are lettered a to h from White's left to White's right. The eight rows, called ranks, are numbered 1 to 8 starting from White's side. Each square is named by its file and then its rank, so the corner to White's left is a1 and the opposite corner is h8.

A few landmarks help you find your way. White's king starts on e1 and Black's on e8. The queens start on d1 and d8. White's pawns all begin on the 2nd rank and Black's on the 7th. A useful check: the square in each player's bottom-right corner (h1 for White, a8 for Black) is always a light square.

Naming the pieces

Each piece except the pawn has a capital letter:

Pawns have no letter. A move is written as the piece letter followed by the square it moves to. Nf3 means a knight moves to f3; e4 means a pawn moves to e4. You never write where the piece came from unless it's needed to avoid confusion, because the position makes it clear.

Captures, checks and mate

Castling, promotion and en passant

Castling has its own symbols. O-O is castling on the king's side (short castling) and O-O-O is castling on the queen's side (long castling). The number of O's matches the number of squares between the king and the rook it castles with: two on the king's side, three on the queen's side.

Promotion is written with an equals sign and the new piece: e8=Q is a pawn reaching e8 and becoming a queen. If it captured on the way, it reads like dxe8=Q. Promoting to anything other than a queen is called underpromotion, and you'll occasionally see =N when a knight gives a vital check.

En passant is written as an ordinary pawn capture, to the square the capturing pawn lands on. Some books add e.p. after it.

When two pieces could make the same move

Suppose both of White's knights could jump to d2. Writing Nd2 would be ambiguous, so you add the file of the knight that moves: Nbd2 means the knight from the b-file. If the two pieces share a file, use the rank instead: R1e2. In the rare case where neither alone is enough, give the full starting square: Qh4e1.

Reading a whole game

Moves are numbered in pairs, White's move first. A short game reads like this:

1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6

Here White played the pawn to e4 and Black answered with the pawn to e5. On move 2 White brought a knight to f3 and Black a knight to c6. On move 3 White's bishop went to b5 and Black's a-pawn went to a6. That position is the start of the Ruy Lopez, one of the oldest openings in chess.

When a comment interrupts between White's move and Black's reply, Black's move is written with three dots: 3...a6.

The punctuation marks

Annotators judge moves with symbols borrowed from punctuation:

The result comes at the end: 1-0 means White won, 0-1 Black won, and ½-½ a draw.

PGN and FEN

Computers store games in PGN (Portable Game Notation), which is simply algebraic notation with a header listing the players, date and result. Any chess program can open a PGN file. A single position is stored as a FEN string, one line that lists every piece rank by rank, whose turn it is, castling rights and a few counters. You won't write FEN by hand, but it's how puzzles and analysis boards share positions.

Practise it

The fastest way to learn notation is to use it. Play a game, then open the move list in the menu and read the moves back while you picture the board. Then try replaying a famous game from a book without looking at the diagrams. After a few games you'll read Nxe5 as easily as a word.

Keep learning

Practise on the board