How To Play Chess Online: Chess Rules

Chess has been around for a long time, but it’s never been more accessible than today. Today, you can play chess anytime, and because of this, new players are picking up chess. The online chess community is booming, and there are even online chess tournaments.

Despite its popularity, many still don’t understand the rules of chess or how to play chess. That’s why Amphy will be your window for expanding your chess knowledge. For instance, check out Online Live Chess Lessons: Openings for Beginners if you want to learn chess openings.

Remember playing chess online is extremely similar to over-the-board chess, but you have to remember some rules are more difficult to enforce online than over-the-board and vice versa.

What Is Online Chess?

Chess is a two-player strategy board game that pits you against the other player. When you play chess, you control pieces that function and move differently to accomplish one goal, capturing the enemy king.

One player plays as white, and the other plays as Black. The player controlling the white pieces will always make the first move, and Black will follow. The turn order will never change, and the game will go until a player captures the enemy king or they resign.

For more detail into the finite rules of chess, consider reading The Undisputed Rules of Chess: How To Play Chess.

The #1 Reason Why You Need To Play Chess Online

With the internet, we can connect to anyone anywhere. If you want to learn chess, you can learn from chess grandmasters. With Amphy, everyone can access chess courses and coaches to improve their gameplay.

Check out this coach on Amphy, Chess Lessons with Tomer: Live Online Chess Coach, if you want direct help from an online coach that will help you anytime and anywhere.

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Chess has been around for a long time, but it's never been more accessible than today.

Is Chess Online Free?

Most of the time, playing chess online is free, but there are benefits to investing a bit of money when you play chess online. Playing the game on almost every platform is free. Learning the game at a professional level will require money and time investment.

How to Start Playing Chess Online

There are numerous ways to play chess online. The best way to play chess is by finding professionals on Amphy. Additionally, you can play online chess games against computer opponents.

Playing against strong computer opponents may provide insight into where you stand skill-wise before playing against real opponents. After that, you’ll look for a platform that emulates chess on your browser.

The most popular method people use to emulate chess online is chess.com, but there are other options too. Chess24, Lichess.org, and playchess.com are all great alternatives to playing chess online.

Step 1: Pick The Game Mode You Want To Play

You’ll pick between rapid, blitz, or bullet chess. Some chess sites let you do more traditional long-form chess, but most online games are fast. Usually, an online chess game will last three to fifteen minutes, depending on what mode you play.

To improve at chess, you’ll want to dedicate most of your time to one game mode. If you want to play blitz, dedicate your effort to learning chess for blitz. Swapping around game modes too much will lead to confusion and mistakes, as each game mode has different strategies

Step 2: Learn How Your Pieces Move

You click and drag pieces to your desired location when playing chess online. Additionally, chess online has distinct advantages you should take advantage of. Usually, you will see the areas that each piece can move, making it easier to understand how your chess pieces move.

Maneuvers such as castling and en passant are completely legal and work the same as they do in over-the-board chess.

Step 3: Learn How to Capture Pieces

You’ll place your piece on top of your opponent’s piece to capture it. The chess engine will take care of the rest. Additionally, the chess emulator will keep track of your points depending on which platform you’re playing.

Step 4: Learn to Use Analysis Tools

Playing chess online allows you to use chess engines to review your games. Ensure that you save your games and import them into chess engines, like stockfish, to get a full analysis of your game to see where you can improve and what moves you should have made.

Some Chess Online Rules You Must Consider

Most websites enforce a few rules online when you’re playing chess online. While regulations don’t change from over-the-board chess, there are other things to consider. First, you must be the one playing on your account.

Chess is a competitive game, and when you make a chess account, most platforms expect you to be the one playing. Even though you’re playing online, you still must have good sportsmanship and respect your opponent.

Second, just because you’re not face-to-face with your opponent doesn’t mean you can cheat. It’s easier to cheat online than over the board, but online chess sites still have impressive measures to detect cheating.

Using online chess engines like stockfish to cheat during matches is strictly forbidden. Online chess engines are for analyzing games, not for playing the game for you.

Tips for Successful Online Chess

Here are some tips to help you succeed in playing chess and learning it to the best of your abilities.

Keep playing: The best way to learn chess is to keep playing games. You’ll get familiar with the game and keep improving if you stick with playing chess.
Take breaks: While this may seem counterproductive to the previous tip, taking breaks is still important. Long chess hours can lead to burning out, and breaks are also essential to keep your mind sharp.
Learn from your mistakes: Don’t let your losses go to waste. Review as often as possible and have others review your games for you. Amphy coaches will help review your matches and break down what you should have done and what you can do better in your next game.
Play stronger opponents: Always take the opportunity to play opponents stronger than you. You’ll see how you match up to their skill and learn how they deal with your strategies.