Checkers gets dismissed as chess for people who cannot be bothered with chess, and it has been dismissed that way for about three hundred years by people who then lose to their grandmother. The reason is one rule. In English checkers, the version played on an 8x8 board almost everywhere, capturing is compulsory: if you can jump, you must. That single rule turns a simple game into a game of forcing sequences, where the best move is often to give a piece away, and it is why a computer needed the better part of two decades to prove that the whole thing is a draw. This guide covers the rules as our board plays them, the habits that win most games between humans, and how to get a result against the Hard computer.
How does checkers work?
Each player has twelve pieces on the dark squares of the three rows nearest them, and only the dark squares are ever used. A piece, called a man, moves one square diagonally forward onto an empty square. It captures by jumping diagonally over an adjacent enemy piece into the empty square directly beyond, and if the same piece can jump again from where it lands, it keeps going in the same turn. Captures are mandatory: if any capture is available anywhere on the board you must take one, though when several are available you may choose which. A man that reaches the far row is crowned a King and from then on moves and captures backward as well as forward, still one square at a time. You win by capturing every enemy piece or by leaving your opponent with no legal move.
How to play checkers (step by step)
- Open toward the centre; the middle squares are where pieces are both safe and mobile.
- Keep your pieces in touch with each other, so anything that jumps one of them can be jumped back.
- Before every move, look for the jump you would be forced to make next turn, because your opponent is looking for it too.
- Hold your back row as long as you can; every square you leave open there is a crowning square for them.
- Trade pieces when you are ahead and refuse trades when you are behind.
- Get a King first, and use it to hunt from behind while your men hold the front.
Forced captures are the whole game
Because your opponent must jump when they can, you can move their piece for them. Put a man where it can be taken and it will be taken; the only question is what square their piece lands on afterward, and whether that square is next to something of yours that can jump it. The basic shot is the two-for-one: offer one man so that the capturing piece lands in front of two of yours in a line, then jump both. The three-for-one and the shot that ends with a crowned King are the same idea with more moving parts. Read every position from that angle, in both directions. When you are the one being offered a free piece, ask what happens after you take it, because in checkers a free piece is almost never free.
Keep your pieces connected
A man can only be jumped if the square behind it is empty. So a man with a friend diagonally behind it cannot be captured from the front, and a compact group of pieces moving up the board together is far harder to break than the same pieces spread out. Beginners advance one man at a time and lose it. Better players move in pairs and triangles, so that any jump lands the enemy piece next to something that can jump it straight back. Pieces on the edge of the board cannot be captured at all, but they reach fewer squares than a central piece does, and a game spent hugging the sides is a game spent watching the middle get taken.
The back row and the King race
Your back row is the only thing standing between your opponent's men and a King, and a King is worth more than a man, in most positions closer to two. Keep at least two back-row pieces home for as long as the game allows, ideally the ones covering the squares a man can actually be crowned on. The trade-off is that pieces sitting at home are not fighting, so the usual pattern is to hold the back row through the opening and middlegame and release it only when a trade or a breakthrough makes crowning inevitable anyway. Getting the first King is usually worth a man; a King behind enemy lines can pick off stragglers and force trades that a man never could.
Trade when ahead, count when even
Every even trade makes an advantage bigger in proportion, so a player one man up should look for trades and a player one man down should avoid them. When the count is level, the game turns on tempo: in the endgame, the player who runs out of safe moves first has to step into a jump. Before you enter a simplified ending, count the spare moves each side has. Two Kings usually beat one, but a lone King that reaches a double corner can hold two off indefinitely, which is why the textbook win is three against one, and one King against one is a draw unless somebody blunders. A man that cannot be stopped from crowning is a King already for counting purposes.
Playing our CPU, and why Hard is hard
Our Checkers plays the full rules: mandatory captures, multi-jump chains and Kings. When you pick a piece, its legal squares light up green and its captures red, so the rules are never the thing you get wrong. Easy plays casually. Hard runs an alpha-beta minimax search that deepens move by move, up to seven plies ahead within a time limit, so it will see every two-for-one you leave and every King you are about to concede inside that window. What it cannot see is the slow stuff: a back row held for twenty moves, a wall of connected men that never offers a jump. Play patiently, keep the position closed, and let it be the one that has to step forward. Press U to undo, and against the computer that takes back your move and its reply together, so you can try a line and rewind it. Your wins, losses and draws are kept in your browser, and pass-and-play lets two people share the board.
Where checkers comes from
Checkers, or English draughts, descends from Alquerque, a Moorish game recorded in Spain's Libro de los Juegos of 1283, which was moved onto the chessboard in France, where it was already being played around 1100; the crowned piece appears by the 13th century, and compulsory capture is also a French addition. William Payne's 1756 book, with a foreword by Samuel Johnson, was the first in English. In 2007 Jonathan Schaeffer's team at the University of Alberta announced that their program Chinook had solved the 8x8 game after nearly two decades of computation: with perfect play from both sides, checkers is a draw.
Frequently asked questions
Do you have to jump in checkers?
Yes, in English checkers and in our game. If any capture is available you must take one, and a piece that can keep jumping after its first capture must continue. When more than one capture is available you may choose which to take.
Can a King move more than one square?
Not in English checkers. A King moves and captures one square diagonally in any direction, forward or back. The long-range "flying King" belongs to international draughts on the 10x10 board, which is a different game.
Has checkers been solved?
Yes. In 2007 the Chinook project at the University of Alberta proved that perfect play by both sides ends in a draw. That does not make it pointless; no human plays perfectly, and the forced-capture rule means a single loose move loses.
If you like games where you move your opponent's pieces for them, the Mancala guide is about a board where the counting does the same job, and our tour of the classic board games covers reversi, gomoku and chess alongside it. Everything with two seats sits on the 2-player shelf, and the best 2-player games list is the wider pick for a couch or a classroom.
Play Checkers free in your browser: full rules, Easy or Hard computer, pass-and-play, undo, mouse, touch or keyboard, nothing to install. Keep your men together, hold the back row, and let the forced jumps work for you instead of against you.