Stalemate
Part of the Fundamentals section of Coddy's Chess journey. Lesson 29 of 41.
Chess has a booby trap built into its endings, and it has turned more wins into heartbreak than anything else in the game. It is called stalemate: the player to move has no legal move at all, and their king is not in check.
Black to move. The king is not in check, but g7, g8 and h7 are all covered by the queen. No legal move exists: stalemate.
Read that twice, because it feels wrong at first: no moves plus no check is not a win for the attacker. It is an immediate draw, half a point each, even if the stuck side has a lone king against a full army.
That is why stalemate is the tragedy of the winning side. Below, White is a whole queen ahead and one careless move from throwing it all away:
White to move, a queen up. Qb6 covers a7, b7 and b8 without giving check: the cornered king has nothing left. Draw.
One square makes all the difference. Put the queen on b7 instead, guarded by her own king, and the same corner is checkmate: the king is attacked and has no move. Attacked and stuck wins; merely stuck only draws.
Checkmate, not stalemate: the queen checks on b7 and the white king guards her. The one missing ingredient before was the check.
Try it yourself
The queen-up position from the lesson, seen from Black's chair: the cornered king has exactly one legal move left. Click the square.
Test yourselfThis lesson includes a short quiz. Start the lesson to answer it and track your progress.