Daily Chess Puzzle

How to play Daily Chess Puzzle

Daily Chess Puzzle drops you into a single sharp moment of a chess game and asks one question: what is the winning move? Every position is a genuine tactic with exactly one correct answer for the side to move, so there is no long game to grind through — just find the blow that decides matters. There is one Daily puzzle that is identical for every player on Earth each calendar day, generated by a shared date seed, so you and a friend on the other side of the world are cracking the very same position. When you want more, an unlimited Practice mode serves a fresh random tactic whenever you press the button. Every puzzle is produced and verified entirely inside your browser by an original chess engine that knows the full rules of the game — castling, en passant, promotion, check and checkmate — and confirms that the solution is unique before you ever see it. Nothing is downloaded and nothing is copied from anyone; it all runs offline.

The goal

Play the one move that wins for the side to move. Depending on the puzzle that means delivering checkmate immediately, forcing checkmate in two moves, or capturing decisive material (at least a minor piece’s worth) that your opponent cannot win back. The engine has already checked that every other move is clearly worse, so precision matters: near-misses do not count. Solve it on your first try, without a hint, for the maximum score.

One shared puzzle a day, plus practice

Daily mode gives everyone the same tactic each UTC day, labelled with the date above the board. Because the puzzle is chosen from a date-based seed rather than at random, the whole world solves an identical position — perfect for comparing how quickly you found the answer. Your ranked result for the day is submitted once. Switch to Practice mode for an endless stream of random tactics that never affect your Daily score, ideal for training your eye without any pressure.

The three kinds of puzzle

• Mate in 1 — a single move that checkmates the enemy king on the spot. Worth 1000 points.
• Mate in 2 — a first move that forces mate; the engine plays the toughest defence, then you deliver the finishing checkmate. Worth 2500 points.
• Win material — a move that wins at least three points of material (a knight, bishop, rook or queen) against the best defence, with no full compensation. Worth 1500 points.

How to move

• Tap or click one of your pieces to select it; its legal destinations are marked with dots and rings. Tap a marked square to play the move.
• In a mate-in-two, once you play the correct first move the engine instantly answers with its best defence — then find the move that checkmates to finish the puzzle.
• The Hint button highlights the piece you need to move. It costs you: a solved puzzle scores half when a hint was used.
• Use “Random puzzle” for another practice tactic, or “Today’s puzzle” to return to the shared Daily challenge.

Scoring

Your score rewards seeing the answer quickly and unaided. The base value depends on the type of tactic, then a multiplier is applied for the attempt on which you solved it, and a further penalty if you took a hint. All scores are whole numbers capped at 99,999 for the leaderboard, which is far above any single puzzle’s value.

• Base points: mate in one = 1000, mate in two = 2500, win material = 1500.
• Attempt multiplier: ×1 on your first try, ×0.6 on the second, ×0.3 on the third. You get three attempts in all; a wrong move resets the position so you can try again.
• Hint penalty: if you reveal the hint, the final score is halved.

Chess rules used

The puzzles use standard international chess rules, and the built-in engine enforces every one of them when it checks legality and uniqueness. In particular:

• Castling: the king may castle king-side or queen-side if neither piece has moved, the squares between are empty, and the king does not start in, pass through, or land in check.
• En passant: a pawn that has just advanced two squares can be captured by an enemy pawn as if it had moved only one, on the very next move.
• Promotion: a pawn reaching the far rank becomes a stronger piece — in these puzzles a queen unless a knight, rook or bishop is the winning choice.
• Check and checkmate: you may never leave your own king in check, and the game ends the moment a king is checkmated.

Strategy tips

• Look for checks first. Forcing moves — checks, captures and threats — are where tactics live, and every mate puzzle begins with a move the opponent must answer.
• Hunt for undefended or overloaded pieces. A material puzzle usually turns on a piece that is hanging, pinned, or defended by something that is busy doing another job.
• In a mate in two, work backwards: picture the checkmate you want, then find the first move that removes every escape and leaves it forced no matter how your opponent replies.
• Do not rush the tap. You have only three attempts, and a wrong move costs a multiplier — take a breath and calculate the whole line before you commit.

Frequently asked questions