Chess Notation:

Learning how to textually communicate chess. 

Being a boss: Writing the language of chess:

Intro:

An old chess scoresheet between Morphy and Laroche, dating circa the mid-1800s, that uses an alternative form to that used most widely today and which we will describe.

It should be noted that there are thus actually multiple variations and therefore ways to write a chess game and its moves down notationally. Here, however, we’ll give the most common, and that which you’ll generally use in a tournament: “Algebraic notation.” 

Algebraic chess notation is essentially a way to keep track of moves by representing the various pieces with a single letter, the squares involved in a move with their letter-number grid label, and the action taken (such as a capture, check, etc.) with one or more special symbols. The idea is thus fairly straightforward, and once you get the hang of it, is a cool and useful skill to have.

WRiting algebraic notation:

In Algebraic notation, we denote each piece with the following letter representation:

  • K = King
  • Q = Queen
  • R = Rook
  • B = Bishop
  • N = Knight
  • P = Pawn

Now, a couple of notes here: we use N for Knight as K is already taken for the King, and though P is technically the letter used to represent a pawn, we generally don’t ever write it. You’ll see this shortly.

1. Simple moves:

If just moving a piece to a vacant square, and you are not accomplishing check, a capture, or any other action by doing so, then denote the move simply by writing the letter representation of the piece being moved followed by the label for the square it is being moved to. For instance, if moving the king from e1 to e2, then you’d denote this as:

  • Ke2

The one “special” case is for pawns, for which for Algebraic notation, we essentially always just omit the “P” denoting their piece. As a result, to denote a simple move of the pawn from e2 to e4, we’d just write:

  • e4

And that’s the crux of how to notate your moves: simple. Upon that, we just then add a few more notational descriptors to round out our game recording.

2. Captures:

If you capture a piece, then we also include the fact that it’s a capture in the notation. We do this by putting an “x” letter between the letter representing the piece and the square it is moving to. For example, if our king is feeling particularly aggressive and decides to move from e1 to e2 to capture a knight, then we’d write the move as:

  • Kxe2

Now, for pawns, as usual, we don’t write their “P” letter representation. For a capture, however, we instead write its “P” as the letter for the file the pawn moved from. (This helps distinguish which pawn is taking, for there are a bunch of pawns on either side of the board). For example, if a pawn on e4 were to take a bishop on d5, then we’d write this as:

  • exd5

3. Special Actions:

There are a few special actions to consider, each of which has their own special symbol. If including the case of capturing, then these special symbols are:

  • x: capture
  • 0-0: kingside castle
  • 0-0-0: queenside castle
  • +: check
  • # or ++: checkmate
  • (ep): en passant (ep)
  • =: pawn promotion

There are also chess annotation symbols that you can use as notes to your self (such as ! to what you think is a good move, etc.), but these are optional and so we’ll just focus on those given above.

3.1. Castling:

To denote a castle is straightforward: if it’s a kingside castle, just write:

  • 0-0

or if it’s a queenside castle, then write:

  • 0-0-0

3.2: Check and Checkmate:

To denote a check, simply write a “+” symbol after the notation you’d otherwise use to give that move. For example, suppose that pawn capture from e4 to d5 happened to put the opponent’s king in check (maybe it got lost and found itself near the center of the board). In that case, we’d write the move as:

  • exd5+

Similarly, if the move you make delivers checkmate, then instead of writing a “+” for the check, write a “#” or “++” to denote checkmate. For example, if your lightsquared bishop moved from f1 to c4 to give checkmate, then you could write either:

  • Bc4++ or Bc4#

(Generally, I have seen the “#” notation be used more commonly of the two). 

3.3: Pawn promotion:

Having gotten a pawn all the other way to the other end of the board, and now getting to decide what other piece (other than a king or pawn of course) you’d like to replace it with, we write an “=” followed by the letter label of the piece you decide to promote to after the additional ordinary notation denoting the pawn move.

For example, if you moved a pawn from a7 to a8 and promoted it to a queen, then we’d write this as:

  • a8=Q

and if you did so perhaps with check or even with checkmate, then we could write

  • a8=Q+, or a8=Q# or a8=Q++

respectively.

3.4: En passant:

And in case you almost forgot this special move, we have a notation tailored particularly for it. To denote an en passant, simply write the rank the pawn is moving from followed by an “x,” as usual, followed then by the square the label for the square the pawn is moving to as a result of the en passant, followed then by the notation “(ep)”. Don’t worry if that seems like a mouthful: it’s a special move with a special class of notational wonder. As one example, however, if a pawn on h4 were to perform an en passant on white’s pawn that they just moved from g2 to g4, then we’d denote that as:

  • hxg3(ep)

Keep in mind for an en passant: it may seem counterintuitive, but unlike with “normal” captures, the square we write after the “x” is the square the capturing pawn moved to, and not the square of the captured pawn.

A final consideration: dealing with ambiguity:

Occasionally, you may find that the same notation may represent more than one possible move on the board. This occurs when more than one piece with the same piece label can move or capture to the same square. (For instance, if both knights can capture an opponent’s pawn on e4, then writing Nxe4 wouldn’t tell us in itself which knight we moved to do so). 

When there is such ambiguity as to which piece made the move, then, if it is not a pawn (as recall that such ambiguity is already taken care of by how we notate the file a moving pawn is on), simply follow the letter label for that piece with the file it’s on. For example, following the spirit of our above example, if you had a knight on g3 and a knight on c3, and wished to capture an opponent’s pawn on e4, and you moved the knight on g3 to do so, then instead of simply writing Nxe4, we’d notate this as:

  • Ngxe4

(For other sources on chess notation, you may wish to also check out the following here, from Chess.com, and here, for a blogpost on Chess House on the matter).