Is Scholars Mate The Best Beginner Opening?
GM Magnus Carlsen recently claimed that the Wayward Queen Attack, better known as the Scholar's Mate, is the best opening for beginners.
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Developing your queen on the second move is contrary to opening principles and is rarely played at the top level. Yet, the prospect of a four-move checkmate is tantalizing, particularly against opponents who might not know the right defense. Even against stronger players who won't fall for mate, Carlsen's analysis is fully sound.
What Does The Data Say?
The recently revamped Chess.com Explorer page allows us to test Carlsen's claims. You can see how popular each move is and how well it scores in any rating range. Since Carlsen claimed this was a beginner opening, let's restrict our search to players rated under 600.
Digging a little deeper into the data, we can see that 2.Qh5 is the second-most popular move for White at this level following the moves 1.e4 e5. It scores reasonably well, with White winning half of the games played on Chess.com, against 45% for Black with the remaining games ending in draws.
Overall, results in the Wayward Queen Attack are only minutely worse than after the most most popular move, 2.Nf3. It's also a bit less successful than the Bishop's Opening, but performs no worse than well-respected lines like the Vienna Game, which is much more common among titled players.
The differences between all of these moves are just couple of percentage points each way. Clearly, opening preferences aren't likely to decide games at the amateur level.
What If You Learn Magnus's Line?
If you learn just a little bit of opening theory and follow Magnus's preferred line, it makes the Wayward Queen look like a powerful opening weapon. The last move in Carlsen's video, 5.Ne2, is only the sixth-most popular move for White, but those who play it win an impressive 53% of their games against only 44% losses. Keep in mind, players on the black side must avoid a couple of deadly traps to even reach this position.
How Does It Work At Higher Levels?
In the four-digit rating range, your opponents will rarely allow checkmate in four moves, but you can still get an interesting game with the Wayward Queen Attack. GM Pranav V has tried it in several blitz tournament games, with good results.
GM Hikaru Nakamura has even played the Wayward Queen in multiple classical games.
So is Scholar's Mate the best beginner opening? Maybe not, but it's also far from the worst.
Have you ever tried the Wayward Queen Attack? How did it go? Let us know in the comments!
NM Jeremy Kane is the Instructional Content Manager for Chess.com, and the author of several courses in the Starting Out series, Queen’s Gambit Accepted, Trompowsky, and Tarrasch.
