Hardest Endgame to Win

I don't know why everybody is saying bishop and knight mate is hard, its not that hard to memorize. It is far more difficult to play something like bishop vs knight with some pawns because it is complicated and not a simple memorization

Yeah, bishop and knight mate can be learned with enough practice.

Here is a position that, when practiced against a computer program, gives me fits.  According to the endgame tablebase, with best play, it should take 36 moves.  It usually takes me more, and many times, I make a mistake and draw.  I practice the K+N+B vs K quite often, and, for me, It's very easy compared to this one.

Maybe Queen, Pawn, and King vs. Queen, Pawn, and King.

That shouldn't be too bad right? White is up 2 pawns

Noo f and h pawns or a and c pawns is way harder than 2 central pawns

That doesn't seem too bad. There's a lot of checks so usually it's a draw. I think KQP vs KQ is the hardest. When both sides have a pawn I'm not sure it's that bad.

Yeah I always screw up and blunder a pawn when they aren't connected

At first glance, it should be simple, and perhaps for more advanced players it is.  However, the computer is very good at thwarting my attempts to advance the pawns as they get closer to the promotion squares.

Yeah, I guess so. 

@gooditwoshoes check out this chessable course https://www.chessable.com/course/90

Also the most important general rule is always keep your rook active. So if they attack your pawn its nearly always better to attack their pawn rather than defend your own pawn if possible.

Queen against Rook and pawn is another one that is fairly difficult. Two knights against a pawn is not too bad. Positions with a rook pawn are the hardest, and can take over 100 moves to mate, but still if you put the time in you can learn it.

In my experience almost no one knows almost anything at all about endings below 2000 rating. I have played vs masters on here who trade into losing king pawn endings.

The most important endings to know are king + pawn so you know if you can just trade off the pieces and win and vice versa. After that king+pawn+rook especially the 1 pawn scenarios. Beyond that is master/IM/GM territory learning openings or practicing tactics or reviewing your own games will be way more beneficial.

@woton I just tried that one and seemed very simple. Just keep pawns connected and push king ahead then check the king back with the rook when all squares covered, advance pawns together, repeat

In all endings like this you want your king in front of your pawns

Your doing it wrong. Black won't play Rb4 and the starting position is incorrect. Black will keep the rook on the 2nd rank to prevent the king from moving

And then its easy

Just played it vs lichess I can't force the computer to defend better. In any case its the same general principle. Move king forward check king back. The only way I could see anyone struggling with this is if they make no effort to advance their king.

Put the position into an endgame tablebase

https://www.shredderchess.com/online-chess/online-databases/endgame-database.html

and play the best moves.  For me, the technique is not straight forward, it's fairly convoluted..  Thus, I frequently make mistakes and draw.  As I said, I find the K+N+B vs K much easier.