Moves and Captures

Chess Moves

A move in chess means moving a single chess piece from one square to another square.

When it is your turn to move, you can move any piece that you wish, as long as it is one of your pieces and the move that you play must be a legal move. You will learn later the rules for moving each type of piece - there are six different types of pieces and they all move differently.

The white player always starts the game by moving a white piece from one square to another square. Then it is black's turn to move a black piece, then it is white's turn again and the game continues like this until, finally, the game is over or one player resigns.

Normally, when it is your turn to play, you are allowed to make just one single move. However, there is one special case that you will learn later, which is called castling, during which you are allowed to move two pieces in one turn!! But, apart from that special case, you can only move one piece during each turn.

What about captures?

Usually, when you move a piece to an empty square, then it is simply called a move. However, sometimes there may be an opponent's piece on the square to which you are moving, and in this case it is called a capture because you capture the enemy piece and remove it from the board. This is usually a very good thing to do, as the less enemy pieces, the better!

Now that you know about moves and captures, it is time to take a look at each type of piece, as they are all different. Let's start with the king, as your king is your most important piece...