The Queen's Gambit (Chess Opening)
The oldest opening still in the world championship, and the one most people meet through a television series. It is barely a gambit at all: White offers a wing pawn, and if Black keeps it, White takes the centre and the pawn back.
Last updated
- First moves
- 1. d4 d5 2. c4
- ECO
- D06
- Best for
- White
- Style
- Positional
- Theory
- Moderate
- Level
- Beginner
The Queen's Gambit is 1.d4 d5 2.c4, and the offer in the name is not really an offer. White gives away a wing pawn to drag Black's d-pawn off the centre; if Black takes it, White plays e3, recaptures with the bishop, and ends up with the pawn back AND the middle of the board.
That is why every serious answer keeps a pawn on d5 or takes back the centre another way. The classical choice - the one the whole opening is built around - is to defend d5 with the e-pawn and live with a slightly cramped bishop.
The main line: the Queen's Gambit Declined
The Queen's Gambit Declined, the classical main line. Step through all twelve moves and watch both sides build rather than fight.
Now build White's side of it yourself.
You are White. Play the Queen's Gambit: the two pawns, the knight, the pin, and the quiet move that lets everything else out.
The Accepted: what taking actually costs
2...dxc4 does not lose a pawn - Black gives the pawn back and gets fast, free development in return. What it does lose is the centre.
The Queen's Gambit Accepted - Black takes, and White simply takes the pawn back with the better centre.
The Slav: defending d5 with the other pawn
The Slav Defence - the same pawn on d5, defended by the c-pawn, so the light-squared bishop stays free.
The trap: trying to keep the pawn
Every club player tries this once. Black takes on c4 and then defends the pawn with ...b5, and for one move it looks like it works.
You are White. Let Black grab, then take the queenside apart.
Black has taken on c4. Play the move that offers the pawn back - and when Black tries to hold it with ...b5, punish it.
The plans, for both sides
White's plans. In the Declined, the plan has a name: the minority attack. Play cxd5 exd5, put pawns on a4 and b4 and push b5 to create a weak pawn on c6, then win it. It is slow, it is completely reliable, and it wins club games by itself. In the Accepted, the plan is simpler: keep the extra central pawn, castle, and meet ...c5 with d5 or dxc5 depending on which leaves Black with the worse structure.
Black's plans. Everything Black does in the Declined is about the c8-bishop. Either free it with ...dxc4 and ...b5 and ...Bb7, or trade it off after ...Nh5 hits White's bishop, or accept its life indoors and play for the ...c5 break instead. In the Slav the bishop is already free, which is the whole reason the Slav exists.
The tactics here are quiet ones. The pin on f6 decides a surprising number of games - it is why ...Be7 is played before castling - and a knight arriving on b5 or e5 is a fork waiting for a careless queen. Castling early is not optional in a structure this open.
If the setup appeals but the theory does not, the London System plays the same pieces with the pawn on c3 and almost nothing to learn. If you want the same bishop pointing the other way, that is the Catalan.
Try it
Move two. Play the move that makes this the Queen's Gambit.
The Queen's Gambit is the opening to learn if you want the 1.d4 side of chess explained properly: space, structure, a plan you can name, and three different defences that each teach a different kind of position. The lessons pick up where the theory stops.
Common questions
- What is the Queen's Gambit in chess?
- The opening 1.d4 d5 2.c4. White offers the c-pawn to pull Black's d-pawn off the centre: if Black takes with 2...dxc4, the d5-square is abandoned and White plays e3 and Bxc4 to win the pawn straight back with a big centre. It is the most respected of all 1.d4 openings and has appeared in more world championship games than any other.
- Is the Queen's Gambit a real gambit?
- No, and that is the point. A gambit gives material for time or attack; the Queen's Gambit gives a pawn that cannot be held. After 2...dxc4 3.e3, Black has no way to keep the extra pawn - every attempt (3...b5 above all) loses more than it saves. Calling it a gambit is a four-hundred-year-old piece of marketing.
- What is the difference between the Queen's Gambit Declined and Accepted?
- Declined (2...e6) keeps the pawn chain and accepts a passive light-squared bishop in exchange for a rock-solid centre; it is the classical choice and the main line of this page. Accepted (2...dxc4) hands White the centre and plays for fast development and a ...c5 break instead. Declined is safer, Accepted is freer, and both are completely sound.
- Is the Queen's Gambit good for beginners?
- Very good, with one caveat. The plans are clear - take the centre, develop, castle, put a rook on the c-file - and there are no traps that lose the game on move six. The caveat is that Black has three respectable answers (Declined, Accepted, Slav), so you meet three different structures. Learn the ideas of each rather than the moves, and none of them will surprise you.
- What is the Slav Defence?
- 1.d4 d5 2.c4 c6, defending the d5-pawn with the c-pawn instead of the e-pawn. The whole difference is that the bishop on c8 keeps its diagonal - the one problem the Declined never solves - and the cost is a slower queenside. It is a separate world of theory and one of the most solid defences ever played.
- Is the Netflix show's Queen's Gambit the same opening?
- The same name, yes. The series takes its title from this opening, and the moves shown on the board are real ones - but the show is fiction and the opening is four centuries older than it. What is true is that the popularity is real: after the series aired, this was the most searched-for opening in chess, which is why so many club players now meet 2.c4 every game.
Ideas this opening runs on:
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