A Complete Step-by-Step Guide to Chess Notation

Don't ask me why the easiest and simplest notation style has to sound like a math 401 class from college, but I will promise you that its not as bad as it seems. Depending on how thoroughly you want to learn algebraic notation, it ranges in difficulty from incredibly easy to easy, just with a couple rules and symbols to memorize. 

So how well do you want to learn notation? I've broken algebraic notation down into three levels, each unlocking a new level of detail that can be learned one at a time. At the end of this article, we'll discuss notation timing.

• Level 1 is all you need to play in your first tournament and is perfect for young children needing a simple start.
• Level 2 adds complexity but cleans up situations that might have confused you previously (how to notate castling, disambiguation, promotion, etc...).
• Level 3 is all about the special symbols pros use to enhance the understandability of their scoresheets. 
• When to notate is a question we get all the time. Notate after you hit the clock and before you make your move...details at the end of the article! 

Helpful Resources

• Notation Rules Guide: Rasberry Chess Academy has designed our own cheat sheet to have all notation rules right at your fingertips.
• Companion Quiz: We have built a 40 question quiz! There are ten questions per level plus ten mastery questions!
• Quiz Answers: Don't cheat!!
• Blank Scoresheet: This downloadable and printable resource is great for use in your tournaments or practice games.

Notation Level 1

Notation at its core requires you to describe your move to a reader in the future. To achieve this in the most simple way possible, Algebraic notation believes it's best to simply describe which piece moved and where it went. It simplifies both by turning the chess board into a grid with a letter and number for each square and abbreviating the pieces down to just a single letter. 

Know the Grid System

Most quality chess sets have letters and numbers printed on the outside of each board, but if yours doesn't you'll have to remember the following:

• Each column (vertical line) is assigned a letter with the first column given an "A" proceeding to the last which is given an "H."
• Each row (horizontal line) is assigned a number with the closest row to you given a "1"  proceeding to the last which is given an "8."
• If you're on black's side, the numbers and letters appear reversed as 8 is closest to you and "H" is leftmost.

TIP: For practice, point to a random square and figure out which letter and number belong to it. 

Know the Piece Abbreviations

All pieces except for pawns are assigned a single letter abbreviation to make notation easier. 

• Kings = K
• Queens = Q
• Rooks = R
• Bishops = B
• Knights = N (K's already taken!) 
• Pawns = 

I guess efficiency experts deduced that the absence of a K, Q, R, B, and N could indicate the player used another piece, so they posited that when a pawn gets moved, you don't have to write "P," you can leave it blank!

TIP: Point to a random piece and try to quickly say its letter (or for pawns nothing). Get fast at this!

Putting it Together

Level 1 algebraic notation only requires you to tell me which piece type moved and to what square it landed. Here's how: 

1. Write down the piece abbreviation (not needed if you made a pawn move)
2. Write down the square it moved to: 
   • Start with the column letter
   • Finish with the row numbers

Kids using level 1 notation will run into the occasional confusing move they might notate wrongly, but this will not happen enough to make their notation illegible. This means if they can pass the level one quiz (go take it now!), they can safely play in a tournament.

Notation Level 2

There are three special moves in chess, and one more special situation specific to notation that you should know how to notate if you want fully legible notation.

Special Moves

Write the following for each special move:

• Castles kingside (castling short): O-O
• Castles queenside (castling long): O-O-O
• Promotion to a queen: regular pawn move notation plus:
  • "=Q" for promoting to a queen
  • "=R" for promoting to a rook
  • "=B" for promoting to a bishop
  • "=N" for promoting to a knight
• En passant: nothing different
  • Sometimes you'll see people add "e.p" at the end of the move, but that's optional

Notation has one additional challenge and that's when two of the same type of piece could go to the same square. Example: what if two knights could go to the d2 square? In that case, you need disambiguation, which only has two rules:

• If the two pieces are on different files, again start with the piece abbreviation "N," then add the column from which it came from, let's say it came from b1, "b," then write its destination square like usual, "d2." In total a b1 knight going to d2 would be "Nbd2."
• If the two pieces are on the same file, use their row number in place of the file letter. Let's say there were 2 "b" knights, one on b1 and one on b3. Here we'd write, "N1d2" or "N3d2"

Level two is the trickiest level. Most of these notations don't make general sense so you'll just have to memorize them. Once you think you've got those down and are ready for the quiz, go ahead and take part two of the quiz now! 

Notation Level 3

The last level really just cleans things up. Masters like to point out captures, checks, and checkmates, and those can be done with three special symbols: 

• Capturing? Add "x"
• Checking? Add "+"
• Checkmating? Add "#"

For capturing, write the x after the piece abbreviation, "Bxd5" which could be said as bishop takes on the square d5 (the "x" goes where it sounds like it would). No, it doesn't matter what you took!

For checking or checkmating, add the "+" or "#" at the end, "Bd5+" means bishop moves to the square d5 and checks, or "Bd5#" meaning the bishop moves to d5 and checkmates. 

You will notice for pawns proper notation doesn't just write "x" first because there's no piece letter. For whatever reason, proper notation says you write the pawn file, then "x," then the square to which it moved. This is just like the disambiguation from level 2. This rule makes no sense and half the players don't even follow it, but now you know.