Setting Up

Part of the Fundamentals section of Coddy's Chess journey. Lesson 4 of 41.

Time to put the armies on the board. Both sides set up the same way, mirrored. Here is the full starting position:

The complete chess starting position

Every game in history started exactly like this.

Build the back row from the corners in: rooks in the corners, knights beside them, bishops next. That leaves two center squares for the royal couple, and here is the classic memory hook: the queen goes on her own color. White's queen on d1, a light square; Black's queen on d8, a dark square. The king takes the last free square, on the e-file.

Both queens on their starting squares

Queen on her color: the white queen stands on light d1, the black queen on dark d8.

In front of the whole row, all eight pawns line up: White's on rank 2, Black's on rank 7. Notice the symmetry: the two queens face each other down the d-file, the two kings down the e-file. Chess people even call these the queenside (files a to d) and the kingside (files e to h).

Try it yourself

Click the square where the white queen starts the game.