How to Checkmate in 3 Moves in Chess
Move your King Pawn forward to e4., Capture your opponent's Pawn at f5., Move your White Queen to h5 (Qh5)., Call out checkmate!
Step-by-Step Guide
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Step 1: Move your King Pawn forward to e4.
In both of these methods the key piece for you is your Queen.
The Queen is the piece that you are going to use to achieve the checkmate, so your first move should be to open up space for the Queen to move diagonally.
Moving the King Pawn forward two spaces to square e4 achieves this (e4).
If you're unfamiliar with algebraic chess notation, check out the LifeGuide Hub article to brush up.
As well as freeing your queen, you need your opponent to expose their king.
If black then moves their bishop pawn 2 spaces to f5 to tempt white, the checkmate in three moves is on! -
Step 2: Capture your opponent's Pawn at f5.
Now use your Pawn to capture your opponent's advanced Pawn by attacking on the diagonal.
Notated, that's e4xf5.
Here you are trying to encourage your opponent to move their Knight Pawn forward two spaces to g5, so it is alongside your Pawn.
This isn't a smart move from your opponent, but maybe you can lull her into it.
The idea of this move is to make sure nothing can block off your route to your opponent's King after you make your next move. , Checkmate! Now you can move your Queen on the diagonal to h5 and you have your opponents King pinned.
That's game over! You'll notice that if your opponent hadn't moved their Pawn forward two in their last turn they could have blocked off your Queen by putting a pawn in her way by g6.
You really need your opponent to play into your hands to pull off this three-move checkmate. , Now you can take the King with your Queen on the diagonal and celebrate a very swift victory.
If your opponent has fallen into the trap they will likely be a bit annoyed, so don't gloat too much! -
Step 3: Move your White Queen to h5 (Qh5).
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Step 4: Call out checkmate!
Detailed Guide
In both of these methods the key piece for you is your Queen.
The Queen is the piece that you are going to use to achieve the checkmate, so your first move should be to open up space for the Queen to move diagonally.
Moving the King Pawn forward two spaces to square e4 achieves this (e4).
If you're unfamiliar with algebraic chess notation, check out the LifeGuide Hub article to brush up.
As well as freeing your queen, you need your opponent to expose their king.
If black then moves their bishop pawn 2 spaces to f5 to tempt white, the checkmate in three moves is on!
Now use your Pawn to capture your opponent's advanced Pawn by attacking on the diagonal.
Notated, that's e4xf5.
Here you are trying to encourage your opponent to move their Knight Pawn forward two spaces to g5, so it is alongside your Pawn.
This isn't a smart move from your opponent, but maybe you can lull her into it.
The idea of this move is to make sure nothing can block off your route to your opponent's King after you make your next move. , Checkmate! Now you can move your Queen on the diagonal to h5 and you have your opponents King pinned.
That's game over! You'll notice that if your opponent hadn't moved their Pawn forward two in their last turn they could have blocked off your Queen by putting a pawn in her way by g6.
You really need your opponent to play into your hands to pull off this three-move checkmate. , Now you can take the King with your Queen on the diagonal and celebrate a very swift victory.
If your opponent has fallen into the trap they will likely be a bit annoyed, so don't gloat too much!
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Teresa Young
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