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Checkmate (often shortened to mate) is any game position in chess and other chess-like games in which a player's king is in check (threatened with ) and there is no possible escape. Checkmating the opponent wins the game.
In chess, the king is never actually captured. The player loses as soon as their king is checkmated. In formal games, it is usually considered good etiquette to resign an inevitably lost game before being checkmated.
If a player is not in check but has no legal moves, then it is stalemate, and the game immediately ends in a draw. A checkmating move is recorded in algebraic notation using the hash symbol "#", for example: 34.Qg3#.
In modern Persian, the word mate depicts a frozen, open-mouthed, staring, confused, and unresponsive person—the words "stupefied" or "stunned" bear close correlation. So a possible alternative would be to interpret mate as "unable to respond". A king being in mate (shah-mat) then means a king is unable to respond, which would correspond to there being no response that a player's king can make to the opponent's final move. This interpretation is much closer to the original intent of the game: not to kill a king but to leave him with no viable response other than surrender, which better matches the origin story detailed in the Shahnameh.
In modern parlance, the term checkmate is a metaphor for an irrefutable and strategic victory.
Before about 1600, the game could also be won by capturing all of the opponent's pieces, leaving just a bare king. This style of play is now called annihilation or robado. In Medieval times, players began to consider it nobler to win by checkmate, so annihilation became a half-win for a while, until it was abandoned.
The checkmate with the queen is the most common, and easiest to achieve. It often occurs after a pawn has queened. A checkmate with the rook is also common, but a checkmate with two bishops or with a bishop and knight occurs infrequently. The two-bishop checkmate is fairly easy to accomplish, but the bishop and knight checkmate is difficult and requires precision.
With the side with the queen to move, checkmate can be forced in at most ten moves from any starting position, with optimal play by both sides, but usually fewer moves are required. In positions in which a pawn has just promoted to a queen, at most nine moves are required.
In the position diagrammed, White checkmates easily by confining the black king to a rectangle and shrinking the rectangle to the king to the edge of the board:
Avoid stalemate
The winning side must be careful to not stalemate the opposing king, whereas the defender would like to get into such a position. There are five general types of stalemate positions that can occur, which the stronger side must avoid. The first two are more common.
The first diagram shows the basic checkmate position with a rook, which can occur on any edge of the board. The black king can be on any square on the edge of the board, the white king is in opposition to it, and the rook can check from any square on the rank or file (assuming that it cannot be captured). The second diagram shows a slightly different position where the kings are not in opposition but the defending king must be in a corner.
With the side with the rook to move, checkmate can be forced in at most sixteen moves from any starting position. Again, see for a demonstration of how the king and rook versus king mate is achieved.
In the third diagram position, White checkmates by confining the black king to a rectangle and shrinking the rectangle to force the king to the edge of the board:
Avoid stalemate
There are two stalemate patterns:
| + Checkmates with two bishops |
The king and bishops cooperate to drive the enemy king to an edge of the board, and then into a corner to deliver the mate. "The process, though a bit lengthy, is fascinating because it gives us a glimpse of the power of the two bishops on the open board."
Three basic checkmate positions are possible via the two bishops checkmate. The first is a checkmate in the corner. The second position is a checkmate on a side square next to the corner square (this position can theoretically occur anywhere along an edge, but can only be forced adjacent to a corner). With the side with the bishops to move, checkmate can be forced in at most nineteen moves, except in some very rare positions (0.03% of the possible positions). The third position, checkmating the king on an edge square that is neither a corner nor its adjacent side squares, is possible but not forceable.
It is not too difficult for two bishops to force checkmate, with the aid of their king. Two principles apply:
This is not the shortest forced checkmate from this position. Müller and Lamprecht give a fifteen-move solution; however, it contains an inaccurate move by Black (according to endgame tablebases).
Avoid stalemate
One example of a stalemate is this position, where 1.Kb6 (marked with the x) would be stalemate.
| + Checkmates with a bishop and a knight |
With the side with the bishop and knight to move, checkmate can be forced in at most thirty-three moves from any starting position, except those in which the defending king is initially forking the bishop and knight and it is not possible to defend both. However, the mating process requires accurate play, since a few errors could result in a draw either by the fifty-move rule or stalemate.
Opinions differ as to whether or not a player should learn this checkmate procedure. James Howell omits the checkmate with two bishops in his book because it rarely occurs but includes the bishop and knight checkmate. Howell says that he has had it three times (always on the defending side) and that it occurs more often than the checkmate with two bishops. On the other hand, Jeremy Silman includes the checkmate with two bishops but not the bishop plus knight checkmate because he has had it only once and his friend John Watson has never had it. Silman says: "... mastering it would take a significant chunk of time. Should the chess hopeful really spend many of his precious hours he's put aside for chess study learning an endgame he will achieve (at most) only once or twice in his lifetime?"
Avoid stalemate
This position is an example of a stalemate, from the end of a 1966 endgame study by A. H. Branton. White has just moved 1.Na3+? If Black moves 1...Kc1!, then White must move his bishop to save it because if the bishop is , the position is a draw because of the rule. But after any bishop move, the position is a stalemate.
The moves might be played in a different order or in slight variation, but the basic idea is the same: the queen and bishop combine in a simple mating attack on f7 (or f2 if Black is performing the mate). There are also other ways to checkmate in four moves.
resulting in the position shown. (The pattern can have slight variations, for example White might play f4 instead of f3 or move the g-pawn first, and Black might play ...e6 instead of ...e5.)
| + Timman vs. Short, 1990 |
A smothered mate is a checkmate delivered by a knight in which the mated king is unable to move because it is surrounded (or smothered) by its own pieces.
The mate is usually seen in a corner of the board, since fewer pieces are needed to surround the king there. The most common form of smothered mate is seen in the adjacent diagram. The knight on f7 delivers mate to the king on h8 which is prevented from escaping the check by the rook on g8 and the pawns on g7 and h7. Similarly, White can be mated with the white king on h1 and the knight on f2.
White also wins if Black is to move first:
This checkmate occurred in Jesús Nogueiras–Maikel Gongora, 2001 Cuban Championship (see diagram), which proceeded:
A similar position with the knight on d2 is more than 500 years old, identified as "Partito n. 23" by Luca Pacioli, in his MS De ludo scachorum (Latin for "The game of chess"), dated 1498 and recently reprinted (Gli scacchi) by Aboca Museum Edizioni.
It is impossible to force checkmate with a king and two knights, although checkmate positions are possible (see the first diagram). In the second diagram, if Black plays 1...Ka8 White can checkmate with 2.Nbc7#, but Black can play 1...Kc8 and escape the threat. The defender's task is easy – they simply have to avoid moving into a position in which they can be checkmated on the next move, and they always have another move available in such situations.
In the third diagram, one knight is guarding c1, leaving the other knight to try to checkmate. After 1.Ndc3+ Ka1, White needs to get the knight on e2 to c2. But if White plays 2.Nd4, Black is .
Under some circumstances, two knights and a king can force checkmate against a king and pawn (or rarely more pawns). The winning plan, quite difficult to execute in practice, is to blockade the enemy pawn(s) with one of the knights, maneuver the enemy king into a stalemated position, then bring the other knight over to checkmate. (See Two knights endgame.)
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