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Guide

How to Play Checkers

Checkers is a diagonal game of forced trades. Learn the board setup, how men and kings move, why every capture is mandatory, and the habits that beat the computer.

Play Checkers

The objective

Capture every enemy piece — or leave them no move

Checkers (draughts) is a two-player game played only on the dark squares of an 8×8 board. You and the computer each start with 12 pieces. On your turn you slide one piece diagonally forward; when an enemy piece sits in front of you with an empty square beyond, you jump it and take it off the board.

You win the moment your opponent has no pieces left, or still has pieces but cannot make a single legal move. There is no timer. The entire challenge is calculation — and because captures are compulsory, a careless move can be punished immediately.

The game is free and runs in your browser with no account. Open play checkers for the board; use this guide for the full ruleset and the ideas that win games.

Setup

Twelve pieces, three rows, dark squares only

Each side fills the 12 dark squares of the three rows nearest to it. The two middle rows start empty. Red always moves first — pick Red on the start screen to open the game, or White to let the computer move first.

Ordinary pieces are called men. A man that reaches the far row is promoted to a king and marked with a crown.

Controls

Click, or play entirely from the keyboard

Select a piece and every legal destination lights up. Legal captures are ringed; quiet moves show a dot. Multi-jumps finish in one click on the final square.

  • Mouse & touch

    Click / tap

    Click one of your pieces to select it — every legal destination lights up. Click a highlighted square to move there. Multi-jumps resolve in a single click on the final landing square. Click the piece again, or an empty square, to deselect.

  • Keyboard

    Arrow keys + Enter

    Move the on-board cursor with the arrow keys and press Enter or Space to pick up a piece, then again to drop it on a highlighted square. Escape cancels a selection. Full keyboard play needs no mouse at all.

  • Shortcuts

    N, U, M

    Press N for a new game, U to undo your last move (it also takes back the computer’s reply), and M to mute or unmute the sound effects.

The move loop

Six ideas that cover every turn

Once these are second nature, you know how to play checkers. The rest is practice.

  1. 1

    Set up the board

    Checkers is played on the 32 dark squares of an 8×8 board. Each side starts with 12 pieces filling the three rows closest to it. Red always moves first.

  2. 2

    Move diagonally forward

    On your turn, slide one piece diagonally forward to an empty adjacent dark square. Ordinary pieces (men) can only move forward, never sideways or straight.

  3. 3

    Jump to capture

    If an enemy piece sits diagonally in front of you with an empty square just beyond it, you jump over it and remove it from the board. Captures are mandatory — if a jump is available, you must take it.

  4. 4

    Chain multi-jumps

    After landing from a jump, if the same piece can jump again, it must keep going. A single turn can capture two, three, or more pieces in one sweep.

  5. 5

    Crown a king

    Reach the far row and your man is crowned a king. Kings move and capture diagonally both forward and backward, one square at a time, which makes them far more dangerous.

  6. 6

    Win the game

    You win when your opponent has no pieces left, or when they still have pieces but cannot make a single legal move. If neither side can force a win, the game is a draw.

Captures & kings

The rules in full

This game enforces the standard American / English draughts ruleset — the same one used in club play.

  • The objective

    Capture all 12 of your opponent’s pieces, or block them so completely that they have no legal move on their turn. Either one ends the game in your favour.

  • How men move

    A man moves one square diagonally forward to an empty dark square. It captures by jumping diagonally forward over an adjacent enemy piece onto the empty square beyond. Men never move or capture backward.

  • Forced captures

    If any capture is available anywhere on the board, you must play a capture — a quiet move is illegal that turn. When a jump leads to another jump with the same piece, the sequence must be completed. This game always enforces the forced-capture rule.

  • Kings

    A man that finishes its move on the opponent’s back row is crowned. A king moves and captures diagonally in all four directions, one square per step. It is not a "flying" king — it cannot travel multiple empty squares in a single move.

  • Promotion ends the turn

    If a man reaches the back row in the middle of a jump sequence, it is crowned and the turn ends immediately, even if the newly made king could theoretically jump again.

  • Draws

    A game is drawn when neither side can make progress. This version calls a draw after 40 moves by each player with no capture and no promotion — the standard stalemate safeguard.

Use New game from the board menu to restart at any time, or press U to take back your last move. More edge cases are covered in the checkers FAQ.

Common mistakes

How beginners lose to the computer

Most losses are a missed one-move threat, not bad luck. These are the patterns to watch for.

  • Moving without checking for a shot

    Before every move, scan for any piece you could be forced to give up. The forced-capture rule means the opponent can set traps that spring the moment you touch the wrong piece.

  • Emptying the back row too early

    Advancing your back-rank men for a small tempo gain hands the opponent open promotion lanes. A single early king often decides the game.

  • Chasing a king with lone men

    One king can dance around scattered single men forever and pick them off. Corner a king with a connected group, or leave it alone and win elsewhere.

  • Trading while behind

    Down a piece, every exchange makes the position simpler and more hopeless. Keep pieces on, complicate, and look for a swindle instead.

Strategy habits

Tips to win more games

Treat these as habits, not tricks. For a full walkthrough, see the strategy guide.

  • Push pieces toward the centre — central pieces have more moves and more influence than pieces stranded on the edge.
  • Hold your back row as long as you can; it stops the opponent from getting an easy king.
  • Keep your men connected in a diagonal chain so a jump is always answered by a re-capture.
  • When you are ahead on material, trade pieces off — every exchange makes your lead bigger.
  • Do not rush to king a piece if it means abandoning the centre; a well-placed man can be worth more than a trapped king.
  • Look one move past every jump. A capture that leaves your piece exposed to a double-jump is usually a losing move.

Where you can play

Same game on phone and desktop

The board scales to any screen and never needs a page reload to restart. Progress lives in the browser you played in.

  • Desktop browsers

    Chrome, Edge, Firefox, and Safari all run the game with no plugin. Play with the mouse, or entirely from the keyboard with the arrow-key cursor and Enter.

  • Phones and tablets

    The board and controls are built to sit above the fold on a phone. Tap a piece, tap a lit square. The board scales to your screen and restarts instantly with no page reload.

  • Progress on this device

    Your win–loss–draw record, current and best win streak, and best single-game capture count live in local browser storage. They stay until you reset them or clear site data, and they do not sync across devices.

Still stuck on a rule? Read the checkers FAQ, see who makes CheckersOnline.games, or jump in and play.

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