A clear guide to the chess piece names and what each one does, from the powerful queen to the humble pawn, plus the letter each piece uses in notation.
The chess piece names are the natural starting point for anyone learning the game, because you cannot follow a single move until you can tell a king from a knight. A standard chess set contains thirty-two pieces in total, sixteen for each player, and they come in six different types: the king, the queen, the rook, the bishop, the knight, and the pawn. Each type has its own name, its own symbol, and its own way of moving across the sixty-four squares of the board.
In this guide we will name every piece, explain exactly what it does, and show the letter each one uses in algebraic notation, the shorthand players use to record games. Learn these six names well and the rest of chess opens up quickly, because every tactic, opening, and endgame is simply these pieces working together. Let us meet them one by one, starting with the most important piece of all.
The King: The Piece You Protect at All Costs
The king is the tallest piece on the board, usually topped with a small cross, and it is the single most important piece in chess even though it is far from the strongest. The entire game revolves around it. When a king is under attack it is said to be in check, and when it is attacked and cannot escape, that is checkmate and the game ends at once. The king can never actually be captured or removed from the board; the goal is simply to trap it.
The king moves one square in any direction, whether horizontally, vertically, or diagonally. That single step makes it slow, so it usually stays sheltered during the opening and middlegame, often tucked safely into a corner after castling. In the endgame, when fewer pieces remain and checkmate threats fade, the king becomes an active fighting piece that marches toward the center. In algebraic notation the king is written with the letter K, as in Kf1.
The Queen: The Most Powerful Piece
The queen stands beside the king at the start and is by far the most powerful piece on the board. She combines the movement of a rook and a bishop, sliding any number of empty squares in a straight line up, down, sideways, or along both diagonals. From an open central square a single queen can control more than two dozen squares at once, which is why losing your queen for nothing is usually a game-ending mistake.
Because she is so valuable, experienced players avoid bringing the queen out too early, where enemy pieces can chase her around and gain time for free. Each side begins with one queen, but a pawn that reaches the far end of the board can promote into a second or even a third queen, a rule we will return to. In notation the queen uses the letter Q, as in Qh5. A handy memory aid for the setup is that the queen starts on her own color: the white queen on a light square, the black queen on a dark square.
Rooks, Bishops, and Knights
After the king and queen come the rooks, bishops, and knights. The two rooks look like castle towers and sit in the corners. A rook moves any number of squares in a straight line, horizontally or vertically, which makes it a powerful long-range piece, especially on open files and ranks. Rooks are called major pieces, along with the queen, because a single rook and king can force checkmate against a lone king.
The two bishops start next to the king and queen. Each bishop moves any number of squares diagonally, and because it never changes the color of the square it stands on, one of your bishops travels only on light squares and the other only on dark squares. The two knights sit between the bishops and the rooks and move in the most unusual way in chess: an L-shape of two squares in one direction and then one square at a right angle.
The knight is the only piece that can jump over other pieces, which makes it deadly in crowded positions. Bishops and knights together are called the minor pieces. To avoid confusion with the king, the knight is written with the letter N, as in Nf3, while the bishop uses B and the rook uses R.
The Pawn: Small but Full of Potential
Each player begins with eight pawns lined up across the second rank, forming the front line of the army. The pawn is the least powerful piece, but it has several special quirks. A pawn moves straight forward one square at a time, yet it captures diagonally, one square ahead to the left or the right. On its very first move each pawn has the option of advancing two squares instead of one.
Two more rules make pawns fascinating. The first is en passant, a special capture that can occur when an enemy pawn uses its two-square jump to slip past yours; you may capture it as if it had moved only one square, but only on the move immediately after. The second is promotion: when a pawn reaches the far end of the board it must transform into a queen, rook, bishop, or knight of its own color, and players almost always choose a queen. Pawns have no letter of their own in notation. A move like e4 simply names the square the pawn moves to, while exd5 shows a pawn on the e-file capturing on d5.
Put the Names to Work
Now you can name all six chess pieces and describe what each one does: the king you protect, the queen who dominates, the far-reaching rook, the diagonal bishop, the leaping knight, and the humble but ambitious pawn. Recognize their letters, K, Q, R, B, and N, and you will be able to read and record games as easily as you play them.
The fastest way to lock these names into memory is to play real games and name each piece to yourself as you move it. Head to XiangqiPlay to set up a friendly game, try out every piece, and watch your recognition become instant. Once the names feel natural, explore our guides on piece values and how to checkmate to turn this knowledge into winning ideas.