Piece activity
A piece is stronger the more squares it can reach. In the opening, bring your unmoved pieces out, one at a time, to squares where they work.
Develop quickly
Bringing your pieces out to useful squares is called development. Once your knights and bishops are out, you have castled and nothing stands between your rooks, development is done. Develop faster than your opponent and you get to act first, in attack or defense.
Don't move the same piece twice
Each extra move with the same piece leaves the others asleep. An early queen is the classic case: your opponent develops while chasing it, and soon has more pieces in play. Unless you are capturing something or stopping a threat, bring out a piece that has not moved yet.
A knight on the rim is dim
A knight in the center reaches eight squares; on the edge, four or fewer; in a corner, two. c3 and f3 (c6 and f6 for Black) are the knights' natural squares: they develop and aim at the center at the same time.
After 1.d4 d5 2.c4 e6
A good move Nc3
From c3 the knight can go to five squares: a4, b5, d5, e4 and b1. Two of them, d5 and e4, are center squares.
A common mistake Na3
From a3 the knight has only three squares, b1, b5 and c2, and reaches none of the center squares.
Checklist for your games
- Before you move, count the pieces that have not moved yet.
- For each candidate move, check whether the piece reaches more squares than before.
- Don't put pieces on the edge, or behind your own pawns, without a reason.
Practice
Play in the chess dojo and get every move graded →