The World Junior Championship 1987 was a very special event for me. Since it took place in Baguio City (Philippines), it was my first opportunity to travel outside of the "iron curtain" and see the world's top junior players. In those prehistoric ...
Our beloved game of chess has had many legends, world champions, challengers, world-class players, and grandmasters. The games of these masters delight, inspire, and teach us the ways of the royal game. It is common to discuss the greatest playe...
Do you want a sharp opening that most opponents won't know how to defend against? IM Keaton Kiewra demonstrates how 5.d4!? in the Ruy Lopez is easy for White to learn and hard to handle for Black. Try The Challenges! Not what you're looking for...
Sixty-four is too easy for a chess article, so here are sixty-seven chess quotes you may not have seen before. Or maybe you have... Some stand on their own, some have a bit of commentary, and all are hopefully interesting. Enjoy! Jose Capablanca...
You know how the pieces move. Now it's time to learn everything else! Follow along and learn how to win chess games! Try The Challenges! Not what you're looking for? Go back to the video guide. The Language of Chess: This video demo...
Do you ever find yourself confused in closed positions? GM Jon Ludvig Hammer knows just what to do. Check out how he closed positions stop them from winning good positions. See how Vishy Anand ground out a beautiful win against Hammer. Chec...
Learn from the games of the newly updated and amazing Komodo Dragon chess engine! Learn from the dragon's greatest games! Try The Challenges! Not what you're looking for? Go back to the video guide. Komodo Sacs EVERYTHING For Morphy-Styl...
Can you attack like World Champion Smyslov? Vasily Smyslov a World Champion known for his positional play. However, you don't get to be a champion without also possessing attacking genius. FM Andrey Terekhov demonstrates five of Smyslov's best a...
There's a tendency for all of us to define chess through its best and most successful adherents. I've always been of the mind that, while there is no doubt that world champions, potential world champions and all other players near that str...
Are you ready to start playing chess? Watch these videos to learn what you need to know to get started! Not what you're looking for? Go back to the video guide. Want to skip ahead and try the quiz? Check out the challenges here! Try The...
The question in the title of this article might look stupid to many readers. Indeed, who wouldn't like to study a game annotated by a strong player? Well, I am not sure that I have an answer to this question anymore. When I was a kid, an ann...
Many American chess enthusiasts regard FM Alisa Melekhina as one of the strongest female players in the United States. Melekhina has participated in eight different U.S. Women's Championships and has represented the country abroad in two...
GM Ian Nepomniachtchi won the 2020/21 FIDE Candidates tournament and will challenge world champion GM Magnus Carlsen for the world championship beginning in November 2021. Nepomniachtchi won the tournament by playing well in both halves while seve...
josephyossi: “Why don’t you play games?” JS: Almost everyone has some sort of job. My job is chess. For decades I played in many tournaments, winning the American Open, the National Open, the U.S. Open, and other events. And th...
In 1843 Andrei Alexandrovich Ascharin was born in the Estonian coastal town of Pärnu. His parents were of mixed origins: Alexander, of Russian extraction and Louise, of German extraction. This was common amo...
About 30 years ago, the famous Soviet coach Vladimir Zak wrote a book "The Ways of Chess Improvement." I already expressed my opinion about this chess personality in a prior article. Nevertheless, the book was quite interesting, mainly because Zak...
Jan-Krzysztof Duda, the youngest player in the world’s top 20, speaks to David Cox about his experiences of Polish reality television, being superstitious, and why he can’t stand it when other players don’t observe the dress code...
The Catalan is one of the most popular openings at the Grandmaster level and can be a fearsome weapon in the hands of club players as well! Follow along as Grandmaster Georg Meier, one of the world's leading Catalan experts demonstrates how to win...
Chess.com's newest Coach of the Month is CM Gabor Horvath! Gabor is a much-acclaimed coach on Chess.com with numerous enthusiastic testimonials on his profile. He is also a top blogger who regularly shares some of the most instructive blog content...
In the late 1860s, the legendary Paul Morphy had almost entirely retired from chess. He was not the same young genius that he once was. But he still managed to introduce an important opening idea which hadn't been seen in chess before. After the...
Ding Liren, the current world number-three and strongest Chinese chess player in history, speaks to David Cox about the rise of Chinese men’s chess, his remarkable 100-game unbeaten streak and the difficulty of maintaining a relationship whi...
As everyone knows, there are books about tactics and books about positional skills. However, in serious chess, you often don’t know if either are useful or powerful. Perhaps you don’t see anything, then your moves melt into nothing but...
Endgames with opposite-colored bishops are probably the most difficult endgames for lower-rated players to understand. The common misunderstanding here is that all of these endgames are drawn. I wish I had a nickel for every time my students sai...
When I reflect on the earliest stages of my chess career, it's not the thrill of victory, the five-foot trophies that I could barely lift from the ground, or even the accolades, certificates and triple-digit rating gains that dominate my recollect...
