It's at https://lichess.org/. Even if you don't play chess I suggest click the link and be amazed.
Lichess is the best place to play chess, watch chess games, study chess, and it's the best place to learn how to play chess. Everything is created to make it fun and easy.
It's totally free including free computer analysis of your games which is excellent. There are zero ads. The website depends on donations but never asks people to donate. A minority of chess players at Lichess contribute any amount they want which is paid monthly with a credit card or PayPal. That minority is very large because the website has thousands of users. https://lichess.org/ is the 2nd most popular chess website.
The most popular website is chess.com which is inferior to lichess.org and they make people pay to get inferior computer analysis. And the disgusting place has annoying ads. Why do people use chess.com? It's either a stupidity problem or they do not know lichess.org exists. To defend their inferior disgusting chess website they vaporize the word lichess.org and they prevent those people from ever being able to write a comment again. At lichess.org there is no censorship. Chess.com requires censorship to exist.
The brilliant programmers at lichess are constantly making minor or major improvements to the website. It's already perfect but they will always be making it more perfect. They keep inventing stuff we never knew we needed.
Lichess was created by Thibault Duplessis who lives in France. He will be famous for thousands of years. Lichess was launched on June 3, 2010.
Some information about https://lichess.org:
Wikipedia - Lichess
Lichess (
/'liː-tʃɛs/ (help·info)[5] is an Internet chess server. Anyone can play anonymously, although players may register an account on the site to play rated games. All features are available for free, as the site is funded by donations.[6][7][8]HISTORY
Lichess was founded by Thibault Duplessis, a French programmer. The software running Lichess and the design are open source under the AGPL license.[9]
As of 14 January 2018, lichess.org had a global rank of 2,312 at Alexa, with most of its visitors coming from the United States, Germany, Russia, United Kingdom, and Iran.[10] Lichess is ranked second only to Chess.com as one of the most popular online chess servers in the world.[11]
On February 11, 2015, an official Lichess mobile app was released for Android devices.[12] An app for mobile devices running iOS was released on March 4, 2015.[13]
Being ad-free, Lichess relies on donated money to maintain over a dozen servers with over a hundred processor cores while paying programmers.[14]
Type of site Internet chess server
Available in English. Portions of the website have been translated to over 80 languages, with about 30 languages marked as "complete," but many important parts, such as the terms of service, privacy policy, blog posts, and coach biographies, are not available for translation.
Created by Thibault Duplessis
Website lichess.org
Alexa rank
1,971 (March 2018)[1]Commercial Non-profit & donation-only
Registration Optional[2]
Launched 3 June 2010[3]
Current status Active
Written in Scala, JavaScript, HTML and CSS[4]
FEATURES
The website allows users to play games of live and correspondence chess against other players at different time controls. It has training features, including chess basics, tactics training, chess coordinates, chess video library, Chess insights, opener explorer, and studies.[15][16] It also has a section where chess coaches can advertise their services to users.
In addition to enabling blindfold chess,[17] the website supports the following chess variants:[18]
Antichess (Losing chess)
Atomic chess
Chess960 (Fischer Random Chess)
Crazyhouse [19]
Horde (a variant of Dunsany's chess)
King of the Hill
Racing Kings
Three-check chess
Lichess has features to assist visually impaired people to play chess on the website.[20] It also has a chess puzzle-based CAPTCHA system.[21][22]
Users can also play games against the Stockfish chess engine at a number of difficulty levels.[23] They may also analyze specific positions from standard chess or any of the supported chess variants. The website implements a version of the Stockfish engine that runs on the user's local machine within the user's web browser for limited or infinite analysis,[24] which will calculate best lines of play or major opponent threats. An opening books based on games played on the site or a database of two million games played by FIDE titled players is available.[25] In Antichess variant, users can switch for Mark Watkins's antichess solution database.[26]
For registered players, Lichess employs a rating system, and grants the ability to compete in tournaments, post in the forums, and request a server-side full game analysis for any finalized game. The ratings for standard chess are categorized into Ultrabullet, Bullet, Blitz, Rapid, or Classical, depending on the game's total time or estimated total time (if using Fischer time control which increments time after each move).
Lichess runs live tournaments both in standard chess and in variant chess, and at different time controls, with the slowest time control being 10 minutes per game. Where it differs from other online chess tournaments is they are run in an arena format where a member can join and leave at any time, and their score is retained if they rejoin during the tournament. In order to join a tournament, there is a requirement for the user to have played a sufficient number of games (in the same time control or the same variant).[27]
A Lichess mobile app is available for iOS and Android.[28]
On the 14th of December 2017 World number one chess player Magnus Carlsen won Lichess's first ever titled arena. He won the following 3, gaining a streak. This streak was broken by a different player. [29]
"Become a Patron of lichess.org". Lichess. Retrieved 22 November 2017. We are a non‑profit association because we believe in a free, world-class chess experience for anyone, anywhere. We rely on support from [lichess users] to make it possible. If you've gotten something out of lichess, please take a second to pitch in!
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Quora - Why is Lichess.org so popular with online chess players?
Tom Boshoff, President of the Regina Chess Club
I found Lichess a year ago and never went back. This is by far the best chess site out there. Here’s why.
Lichess is absolutely free. No Ads. Not pay for upgrades, premium style free, not free for 30 days, I mean every feature is 100% always free and always will be.
Lichess runs on code built in this decade. You’ll have a hard time finding a chess website as sleek and modern looking as Lichess. This gives it improved functionality, including highly advanced cheat detection, browser based Stockfish analysis, and a clean user interface.
The features. Man, so many features. Here are my top-5 favorite features of Lichess:
Chess Insights - Ever wonder if you win more games castling queenside or kingside? What openings do you gain the most rating points using? How quickly do I move each piece in bullet and blitz games? Well, with chess analytics, you can find out.
Two massive opening explorers. How does your opening perform on average with Lichess players? What do the masters play? Lichess offers two opening explorers, with one with every game ever played on Lichess, and the other based on over 2 million master level tournament games. Oh, did I mention it also offers opening explorers for chess variants as well?
Training mode - Unlimited high quality chess puzzles, generated on the fly from actual Lichess games! An engine analyzes each game played on Lichess, and looks for positions that make great chess puzzles. This means that you always see fresh chess puzzles. You get a puzzle solving rating, and you can even go see the game it was played in. For comparison, Chess.com only offers 5 puzzles a day before it asks you for a premium membership, and often repeats puzzles.
Mobile App - Lichess, by far, has the best mobile online chess app out there. If you like playing chess on your phone, no other app comes close in terms of features and user interface.
Tournaments. I love the variety of Lichess tournaments. They use an interesting system where winning 3 or more games in a row gets you a “hot streak” bonus, and you earn double points. This deters draws among top contestants as it kills their streak. It also offers a variety of chess variant tournaments.
So yeah, to put it technically, Lichess.org is the bomb-diggity.
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Håkon Hapnes Strand, 2171 FIDE. Friend of Magnus Carlsen (World Chess Champion).
Lichess stands head and shoulders above its competitors.
Chess.com is by far the most popular chess server, with 17 million users. It has a freemium model, which means that you can play for free, but have to pay for extra features. Compared to other chess servers, this one feels slow and buggy. The quality of players is not that high, and the cheating detection is not that impressive either.
Lichess is a superior alternative to all of these. It’s open-source and you don’t have to pay anything. The software is super slick, with many great features that you won’t find at other servers. It’s the second largest server after chess.com, and has started to attract some really strong players. Lichess was originally developed by one French developer. You can feel that the site is made with love for chess and not in an effort to milk people for money.
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Rick Groszkiewicz, Chess player for 50 years. No longer play tournaments, now online variants.
After hearing about The best free, adless Chess server on Quora, I decided to try it. The user interface is very well done. Plus it has various puzzles, constant flow of games to watch or play. There are hourly tournaments plus a few chess variants (Atomic, anti-chess and three-checks).
But the best feature is the post-game computer analysis. The analysis tells you which move are blunders, versus simply inaccurate, and it seems pretty good. I have used this to analyze my games, as well as those between other players. Here is an example:
Blitz Chess • calcsam vs RGroszkiewicz
UPDATE - lichess keeps improving ... I was amazed when they added the Racing Kings variant, and I can play this variant against Stockfish. They also have the opening explorer for variants, which has proven educational for me. They have made so many improvements that I decided to support them on patron and send them money each month!
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This is what I like about Lichess.org:
It's easy to watch chess games. People can choose from numerous chess games including what time control they want to watch. When a game is over with I can use the free computer analysis to study the game or I can watch another game.
Playing chess at Lichess is fantastic. I can choose any time control I want. Lichess has done everything possible to make playing chess fun.
I have chosen the preferences I want including Game Display, Chess Clock, Game behavior, Privacy, Language, Sound, Background, Board geometry, Board theme, and Piece set.
After I play a game there are many different ways I can study the free computer analysis which I can see about one minute after I click a link to request it.
For example there is "Learn from your mistakes". It let's me "Find a better move" or I can ask to see the solution.
Also I can replay the game using "BY CPL" which slows down the game whenever there is a mistake.
Also I can replay the game using "FAST" or "SLOW" or "REALTIME". REALTIME plays the game at the exact same speed as it was during the game.
Also I can study the game one move at a time using the arrow key or the space bar on my computer.
No matter which option I choose there are arrows that show the best move according to Stockfish.
If I don't want to see those arrows I can turn "Best move arrow" off.
If I want to flip the board I press the F key.
Watching a chess game is like watching a war movie or watching a knife fight except no humans are killed.
I have a profile which shows the history of my rating points in a graph. My profile is at https://lichess.org/@/Bob1949
Some people play chess with their cell phones. Fortunately I have a huge screen to play chess on my Apple desktop computer.
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e4 is algebraic notation. P-K4 is descriptive notation. Virtually everyone in the world uses algebraic notation including Lichess. I prefer descriptive notation but I'm getting used to algebraic. To make it easy Lichess puts the algebraic notation just outside the chess board.
algebraic notation The standard way to record the moves of a chess game, using alphanumeric coordinates for the squares.[8]
descriptive notation A system of recording chess moves, used primarily in the English and Spanish speaking countries until the 1980s. Descriptive notation is based on natural language descriptions of chess moves rendered in abbreviated form, for example "pawn to queen's bishop's fourth" is rendered as "P-QB4". Now replaced by the standard algebraic notation.[111]
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When I have the Black pieces if White's 1st move is Pawn to King Four (P-K4 or e4) then I always use the Sicilian Defense, preferably the Najdorf Variation. If White's 1st move is not P-K4 (aka e4) then I always play the King's Indian Defense.
When I have the White pieces I always play the King's Indian Attack. (In case you know nothing about chess, White always moves first. Obviously chess was invented by racists.)
This way I only need to understand two openings, the King's Indian and the Sicilian. I'm too lazy to study the other numerous openings.
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Sicilian Defence, Najdorf Variation. I play the black side of this opening. It's a very violent game. I frequently get killed but if I can survive the middlegame I have good chances to win the endgame.
Wikipedia - Sicilian Defence, Najdorf Variation
The Najdorf Variation[1] (/ˈnaɪdɔːrf/) of the Sicilian Defence is one of the most respected and deeply studied of all chess openings. Modern Chess Openings calls it the "Cadillac" or "Rolls Royce" of chess openings. The opening is named after the Polish-Argentine grandmaster Miguel Najdorf. Many players have lived by the Najdorf (notably Bobby Fischer and Garry Kasparov, although Kasparov would often transpose into a Scheveningen).
The Najdorf begins:1. e4 c52. Nf3 d63. d4 cxd44. Nxd4 Nf65. Nc3 a6
Black's 5...a6 aims to deny the b5-square to White's knights and light-square bishop while maintaining flexible development. If Black plays 5...e5?! immediately, then after 6.Bb5+! Bd7 (or 6...Nbd7 7.Nf5) 7.Bxd7+ Nbxd7 8.Nf5 and the knight on f5 is difficult to dislodge without concessions.
Black's plan is usually to start a minority attack on the queenside and exert pressure on White's e4-pawn. This is often carried out by means of ...b5, ...Bb7, and placing a knight on c5, or c4 via b6.
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Wikipedia - King's Indian Defence
The King's Indian Defence is a common chess opening. It arises after the moves:
1. d4 Nf62. c4 g6
Black intends to follow up with 3...Bg7 and 4...d6 (the Grünfeld Defence arises when Black plays 3...d5 instead, and is considered a separate opening). White's major third move options are 3.Nc3, 3.Nf3 or 3.g3, with both the King's Indian and Grünfeld playable against these moves. The Encyclopaedia of Chess Openings classifies the King's Indian Defence under the codes E60 through E99.
In the most critical lines of the King's Indian, White erects an imposing pawn centre with Nc3 followed by e4. Black stakes out his own claim to the centre with the Benoni-style ...c5, or ...e5. If White resolves the central pawn tension with d5, then Black follows with either ...b5 and queenside play, or ...f5 and an eventual kingside attack. Meanwhile, White attempts to expand on the opposite wing. The resulting unbalanced positions offer scope for both sides to play for a win.
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Wikipedia - King's Indian Attack
The King's Indian Attack (or KIA), also known as the Barcza System (after Gedeon Barcza), is a chess opening system for White.
The opening is not a series of specific moves, but rather a system that can be played from many different move orders. Though the KIA is often reached via 1.e4 followed by d3, Nd2, Ngf3, g3, Bg2, and 0-0, it can also arise from 1.g3, 1.Nf3, or even 1.d3.
The KIA is a mirror image of the setup adopted by Black in the King's Indian Defence. Yet, because of White's extra tempo, the nature of the subsequent play is often different from that of a typical King's Indian Defence.
By its nature, the KIA is a closed, strategic opening that presents its practitioner with common themes and tactics and a comfortable middlegame against various defences. White's most common plan involves a central pawn push, e4–e5, leading to a central bind, kingside space, and concrete attacking chances on a kingside-castled black king. Black's resources—more queenside space for example—are not to be underestimated. In fact, this asymmetry often leads to violent middlegames and neatly constructed mating nets involving sacrifices.
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In chess there is the opening when each player gets his pieces moved to the best squares and the king is castled. Then there is the middle game which sometimes can be very violent. Then there is the endgame (if there is an endgame) where the game is decided with a small number of pieces and pawns left on the board.
My favorite part of chess is the endgame which appears to be easy but it's often difficult to find the winning moves.
People who want to learn how to play chess should study the basics of chess endgames before they study anything else. This will help them understand which are the best winning positions in the endgame which is the result of the opening and middle game.
If I had to choose my favorite chess piece it would be the bishop. My favorite way to win the endgame is when I use a pair of bishops to defeat an opponent who has one bishop and one knight. My winning chances are good if there are pawns on both sides of the board. "Having two bishops (the bishop pair) is a particularly powerful weapon, especially if the opposing player lacks one or both of their bishops."
Wikipedia - Bishop (chess)
A bishop (♗,♝) is a piece in the board game of chess. Each player begins the game with two bishops. One starts between the king's knight and the king, the other between the queen's knight and the queen. The starting squares are c1 and f1 for White's bishops, and c8 and f8 for Black's bishops.
The bishop has no restrictions in distance for each move, but is limited to diagonal movement. Bishops, like all other pieces except the knight, cannot jump over other pieces. A bishop captures by occupying the square on which an enemy piece sits.
The bishops may be differentiated according to which wing they begin on, i.e. the king's bishop and queen's bishop. As a consequence of its diagonal movement, each bishop always remains on either the white or black squares, and so it is also common to refer to them as light-squared or dark-squared bishops.
Good Bishop and Bad Bishop:
In the middlegame, a player with only one bishop should generally place friendly pawns on squares of the color that the bishop cannot move to. This allows the player to control squares of both colors, allows the bishop to move freely among the pawns, and helps fix enemy pawns on squares on which they can be attacked by the bishop. Such a bishop is often referred to as a "good" bishop.
Conversely, a bishop which is impeded by friendly pawns is often referred to as a "bad bishop" (or sometimes, disparagingly, a "tall pawn"). The black light-squared bishop in the French Defense is a notorious example of this concept. However, a "bad" bishop need not always be a weakness, especially if it is outside its own pawn chains. In addition, having a "bad" bishop may be advantageous in an opposite-colored bishops endgame. Even if the bad bishop is passively placed, it may serve a useful defensive function; a well-known quip from GM Mihai Suba is that "Bad bishops protect good pawns."[1]
In the position from the game Krasenkow versus Zvjaginsev,[2] a thicket of black pawns hems in Black's bishop on c8, so Black is effectively playing with one piece fewer than White. Although the black pawns also obstruct the white bishop on e2, it has many more attacking possibilities, and thus is a good bishop vis-à-vis Black's bad bishop. Black resigned after another ten moves.
Main article: Opposite-colored bishops endgame
Endgames in which each player has only one bishop (and no other pieces besides the king) and the bishops are on opposite colors are often drawn, even when one side has an extra pawn or two. Many of these positions would be a win if the bishops were on the same color.
The Chess World - The Bishop Pair: 5 Things to Know
In modern chess, the bishop pair has been established as a positional advantage in the majority of cases. It’s very common nowadays to hear teachers tell their students ‘keep your bishops’ or ‘capture that bishop’. In today’s chess, the importance given to this element has increased to the point that in some of the most popular opening variations, the main goal has become gaining the bishop pair.
We can see it in the Slav Defense, where after 1. d4 d5 2. c4 c6 3. Nf3 Nf6 4. e3 Bf5 5. Nc3 e6 6. Nh4, white seeks to eliminate the light squares bishop and fight the middlegame/endgame with the positional advantage of the two bishops.
The bishop pair can be a powerful advantage in any phase of the game. For example, it’s a lethal weapon on the attack against the king. It can also be very efficient in attacking weaknesses – one bishop can put pressure on the target, while the other attacks the defending piece. However, it is the endgame where it is particularly strong. In this article, we will show examples of the two bishops in action in different situations of the game.
First, let’s review some basic concepts that you should know when playing with the bishop pair:
When fighting with the two bishops against the bishop and knight, we place the pawns on the same color as our opponent’s bishop. This way, we reduce the mobility of this piece;
In the endgame, it will always be difficult for the side playing against the bishop pair to bring his king to the center, as it will run into annoying checks or even mate threats;
We should always keep in mind that, once a bigger advantage is obtained, we can trade one of the bishops, turning the position into a simple winning endgame;
When there are rooks on the board, it is useful to trade one rook in order to reduce our opponent’s defensive resources. This combination of rook + two bishops works very efficiently together;
When playing the endgame with the bishop pair, we should try to create a passed pawn.
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Wikipedia - Chess strategy
Wikipedia - Chess piece relative value
Wikipedia - Glossary of chess
Wikipedia - Chess
Wikipedia - Rules of chess
Wikipedia - History of chess
Wikipedia - Chess opening
Wikipedia - Chess middlegame
Wikipedia - Chess endgame
Wikipedia - List of chess openings
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This has links to all the pieces and pawns in chess.
An interesting thing about pawns: If somehow they make it all the way to the end of the board a pawn can be promoted to a piece, almost always a queen. The queen is the most powerful piece so queening a pawn is almost always enough to win a game easily.
I love the pawns. There is very much to know about them.
Wikipedia - Chess piece
In the first context, each of the two players begins with the following sixteen pieces in a standard game:
1 king
1 queen
2 rooks
2 bishops
2 knights
8 pawns
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That's it for now. I put this stuff up mostly for myself. Lots of stuff to study.
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