What is chess?

Chess is a very popular game worldwide for several reasons. It has fifteen centuries of documented history, with many fascinating players leaving their mark over time. Additionally, it is linked to both science and art, can be played at any age, and is enjoyed all across the globe, making it a truly universal game without barriers.

Chess is a strategy game played with a board and 32 pieces. The board consists of 64 alternating-colored squares, where two players compete, each on one side of the board with "armies" of different colors. Each "army" consists of 16 pieces: eight pawns, two rooks, two bishops, two knights, one queen, and one king. Each piece moves in a specific way according to the rules of the game. To distinguish between the two players' pieces, white and black are commonly used, though chess sets with other colors also exist.

The objective of the game is to defeat the opposing king. To achieve this, pieces can capture each other, as long as they belong to different sides. A piece cannot capture another of the same color. Whenever a piece can attack the opponent's king, it is called check. If the opponent's king is trapped with no legal moves to escape, the game ends. This move is called checkmate.

There are an enormous number of possible chess games that can be played—specifically, 10¹²³, which is more than the number of atoms in the universe (10⁸⁰). That’s 10 followed by 123 zeros worth of unique games. Even by the second move, there are already 400 different possible positions since White has 20 possible opening moves, and Black also has 20 possible responses, resulting in 400 (20×20) different board positions after just two moves. If we continue the calculations, by Black’s second move, there are already 72084 possible positions. To put that into perspective, a century contains nearly 10¹⁶ microseconds, so if we made one chess move every microsecond, it would take nearly eight centuries to play through all possible combinations.

Players

Throughout history, there have been many great players, but some of the most notable and well-known figures in chess are:

Magnus Carlsen

Garry Kasparov

Bobby Fischer

Judit Polgar

Paul Morphy

Hikaru Nakamura

Competitions

Chess is considered a mind sport because it stimulates critical thinking and requires logical reasoning. It is governed by the International Chess Federation (FIDE), the highest authority in chess as a sport, which regulates the rules and competitions.

Chess can be played both individually and in teams. Since it is a competitive game, various types of tournaments exist:

Knockout (KO) Tournaments: This is the least common format and is similar to most sports tournaments. It follows a single-elimination structure where players face off in rounds, and the winner advances to the next stage until the final, where a champion is crowned. Most knockout tournaments consist of multiple games between two opponents, and the player with the most points moves on to the next round.

Round-Robin (RR) Tournaments: In this format, every player competes against every other player. Scoring is based on points: a win earns 1 point, a loss earns 0, and a draw earns ½ a point. At the end of the tournament, the player with the highest score is declared the winner. There is also a variant called a quad, which is played in teams of four. Chess players take turns playing against each other, and prizes are often awarded to the winners.

Swiss-System (SS) Tournaments: This is the most common type of tournament. Players start by facing an opponent with the same score. If a player loses a game, they are paired in the next round with another player who also lost. If they win, they play against another winner. If they draw, they may be paired against another player who also drew, won, or lost. Typically, Swiss tournaments consist of a set number of rounds, usually 4 or 5, and not all players necessarily play against each other. The winner is determined using a point system similar to round-robin tournaments.

Players

History

Benefits