How to Set Up a Chess Board?

Two rules cover almost everything: the light square goes in the bottom-right corner, and the queen goes on her own colour. Get those right and the rest of the board follows.

Step by step:

1. Orient the board. Turn it so each player has a light square in their bottom-right corner. "Light on right" is the phrase to remember. If you have a dark square there, rotate the board 90 degrees.
2. Place the rooks in the four corners.
3. Place the knights beside the rooks.
4. Place the bishops beside the knights.
5. Place the queen on her own colour — the white queen on the light central square, the black queen on the dark one. "Queen on her colour" is the second phrase to remember.
6. Place the king on the last remaining square, beside the queen.
7. Place the eight pawns across the entire second row in front of everything.

The back row order, from left to right for both players:

Rook, Knight, Bishop, Queen, King, Bishop, Knight, Rook

Because the queens sit on their own colours, the white and black queens face each other directly down the same file, as do the kings.

What the board looks like when set up:

The two mistakes everyone makes:

• Board turned the wrong way. If the bottom-right square is dark, the board is rotated. This changes nothing about how the pieces move, but it means castling and the classic openings look wrong, and diagram positions won't match.
• King and queen swapped. They're adjacent and similar in height, so it's an easy slip. Check the queen is on her matching colour.

Telling the king and queen apart: the king is usually the tallest piece and wears a cross on top. The queen is slightly shorter with a crown of points. In the standard Staunton set this is consistent.

Which side goes first: White always moves first. In casual play, one player hides a pawn of each colour in their hands and the opponent picks.

Board coordinates. Files (columns) are lettered a to h from White's left, and ranks (rows) are numbered 1 to 8 from White's side. So White's king starts on e1 and Black's on e8. Every square has a unique name, which is how chess notation works.

How many squares are on a chess board? The obvious answer is 64 — an 8×8 grid. But the more interesting answer, and the one the question is often really asking, is 204, once you count squares of every size:

The pattern is the sum of the square numbers from 1 to 8. There are also 32 pieces at the start, 16 per side.

Setting up a chess clock, if you're using one: set the same time for both players, place it on the side of the board the players agree on, and each player presses their button after moving. Black traditionally chooses which side the clock sits.

A quick self-check before starting: light square bottom-right, queens facing each other on their own colours, kings beside them, and a full row of pawns in front. If all four are true, the board is correct.