Position Evaluation in Chess

One of the core skills in chess is evaluation the current situation on the board. Thanks to that, we can create a plan and adjust our strategy overtime. Someone who knows how to do that accurately, will significantly increase his chances of winning the game. A lot of players are trying to „just make a move” and think about strategy later on.

It is not the way we should play - to be honest, this is major mistake, which in most cases may lead us to a very bad position. Obviously, this (evaluation) is not so simple but it will definitely pay off. Correct evaluation in chess is crucial and we should make a good habit of following a 5 - step process that would not allow us to forget about anything.

Before we will move on, look at the position and try to evaluate on your own.

What is your evaluation?

The correct answer is White is winning!

Here are a few factors that can make us to say this:

• More space,
• Piece activity,
• King safety,
• Pawn structure,
• Opportunities to launch an attack.

Even though, Black is not losing on the spot, his position is quite unpleasant. To put it in a nutshell - Black has no counterplay, while White can slowly improve his position and potentially create various threats.

Now, let's move to first pillar of position evaluation in chess!

1. Material

Count the material! This is very simple, yet very effective. If you have a pawn-up, this is great. Always remember, that having extra piece in chess is giving you plenty of options but we cannot evaluate the position using only this factor! Still, always start with this easy step - if you don't, you might not realize how difficult your position is.

Look at the position below:

Even though White's position looked great, bishop up for Black is too much and White is collapsing. That's why we should always start with evaluating material situation on the board.

2. King safety

This is very important thing to remember, the game is finished when you get mated (or your opponent)! It does not matter if you had 5 extra Queens 😉. Usually, side with „better” (safer) king have more options and can put more pressure on both sides of the board, where the other one needs to be very careful.

Below you will see one of my favourite examples of luring king to the center!

3. Activity of your pieces

Right now, you need to evaluate positioning of your pieces. You need to go one by one. Do I have bad or good knights? My queen is fine or maybe a little bit too advanced? What about my rooks? And so on…

Once you do that, it is very useful to ask yourself 2 questions:

• Which piece is the strongest one? (Your piece)
• Which one is the worst? (Among your pieces)

These 2 questions may suggest us what do we need to improve and where are the potential tactics.

4. Activity of your opponent’s pieces

Simple as that. Once you evaluated your pieces, you do the same with your opponent’s pieces. This time you can simply reverse that – eliminate your opponent’s strongest piece and play against the worst one. Just like Kramnik did in his game against Carlsen - the full analysis can be found below.

5. Pawn structure/Weaknesses/Outposts

In this step you should look for/at:

• pawn structure – pawn islands, doubled/tripled pawns
• weak pawns - your’s and opponent’s weak pawns
• weak squares – in your and your opponent’s camp
• good squares for your pieces – well-known as outposts 

Additional Questions

After the whole process, It is very useful to use the questions below. Thanks to them, We can ensure nothing has been blundered and where to focus our play.

1. What is my opponent’s idea?
2. On which side of the board should I play?

That's all when it comes to the process of evaluating position in chess. All you have to do is to sum up all the information you have accquired during every single step and figure out the move based on all information.

Kramnik - Carlsen: Analysis

Here we are again in this position. This time we will try to figure out what is going on in this position.

1. Material

If we count the material we can tell that: Black has material advantage - Black is pawn up.

2. King Safety

White's king: White has fianchetto and quite healthy pawn structure around the king,

Black's king: Black has a healthy pawn structure around the king. There is no direct attack on him,

We can say that king safety is realtively equal in this position.

3. Activity of my pieces (White's pieces here)

Queen:	Looks good - great support along c-file as well as pressure along b1-h7 diagonal,
Rook(s):	Rook on a1 is doing a great job of supporting me along a-file. On the other hand, Rook on f1 is not doing too much,
Bishop:	Typical Catalan bishop dominating along long diagonal and keeping position together. Very good placement and contribution to the game,
Knight:	The most active piece for White. Thanks to blocking c6 square Black cannot get his typical c7-c5 break and thus equalizing.

4. Activity of my opponent's pieces

This time we have to evaluate from Black's perspective.

Queen:	Decent piece controlling c6-square, but do not have too many active prospects right now,
Rook(s):	Rook on f8 is not doing too much. On the other hand, Rook on c8 is trying to support c7-c5 idea, yet it is impossible due to the knight on c6,
Bishop:	Decent piece trying to control key squares e.g "c5" or "b4",
Knight:	The most active piece keeping position together and protecting b4 square. This knight is not allowing White to start their intiative.

Best piece: Knight on d5

Worst piece: Rook on f8

5. Pawn structure/Weaknesses/Outposts

White: Good pawn structure, especially pawn chain f2-d4. Great control over c6 & c5 square and the centre. Potenial weak c4-square.

Black: Strong d5 square. Decent pawn structure on kingside. potential weakness on b5 and weakness on c7.

Additional Questions

1. What is my opponent’s idea? - Black wants to take on a3 or just simply protect b4 pawn, keeping material advantage.
2. On which side of the board should I play? - Most of White's pieces are focused on Queenside & Black has some serious issues with b5 and c7 pawn. Taking that into account White should play on Queenside.

Conclusion

White has serious advantage on the queenside. Multiple weaknesses and piece activity should be enoguh to punish Black on that side of the board. The only problem is the fact that Black has material advantage and very nice grip over b4 square thanks to the knight on d5. That means White should eliminate the strongest piece (Knight on d5) and start pressuring along "a" & "c" files by bringing the worst piece (Rook on f1) into play.

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