The King in Chess: How It Moves, Where It Starts, and What It Can't Do
One square, eight directions, and a hard rule that stops you walking into check.
The king in chess moves exactly one square in any direction: up, down, left, right, or along any of the four diagonals. That gives it 8 legal destinations from a central square like d4 and only 3 from a corner like a1. It's the slowest piece you own, and it's the only one whose capture ends the game, which is why a lost king is a lost game rather than a lost point.
The king's move, square by square
The king's reach on an empty board depends entirely on where it stands. Corners are bad. The center is good, and a king that has spent the middlegame on e1 suddenly gets options once the queens come off.
| King on | Squares it can reach | Reason |
|---|---|---|
| a1, h1, a8, h8 (corner) | 3 | Two board edges box it in |
| a4, d1, e8, h5 (edge, not corner) | 5 | One edge |
| d4, e4, e5, c5 (center) | 8 | Open in every direction |
Put a king on e4 with a clear board and it covers d3, d4, d5, e3, e5, f3, f4 and f5. That's a 3 by 3 box with the king sitting in the middle of it. Diagonal steps are just as legal as straight ones, which is the detail people forget in their first week of learning chess.
Obstacles cut that list down fast. Your own pieces block the king the same way they block a rook, and any square attacked by an enemy piece is off limits. The real number of legal king moves in a game is usually 2 or 3. Not 8.
Where the king starts on the board
The white king begins on e1, the black king on e8. Both sit on the center files of the back rank, with the queen beside them on d1 and d8.
Two rules cover the whole back rank and I've never needed a third. The queen goes on her own color, so the white queen takes the light d1 and the black queen takes the dark d8. The corner on each player's right is light, which is where "white on the right" comes from. Get the kings and queens right and the bishops, knights and rooks fall into place around them. There's a fuller walkthrough in this guide to how to put chess pieces on the board.
A full set has 32 pieces, 2 of them kings, one each. If you ever want the complete inventory, here's how many pieces in chess and what each one does.
And a rule that trips up new players: the two kings can never stand on adjacent squares. Ever. Not even for a moment.
Capturing, check, and the one two-square move
A king can capture. Any enemy piece on an adjacent square is fair game, as long as nothing defends it, because the king can't finish its move in check. This is where beginners get burned. The rook looks free, the king steps over, and the bishop on the long diagonal says otherwise. I've walked through the messy cases in can the king take pieces in chess, including the rule that a king can't capture the other king.
Three things a king can never do:
- move to a square attacked by an enemy piece
- stay in check after a move (moving, blocking or capturing are the ways out)
- stand next to the enemy king
Then there's the one move where the king travels two squares: castling. The king slides two squares toward a rook, the rook hops over to the far side, and it's the only move in chess that shifts two pieces at once. On paper the conditions are simple.
| Castling requires | Detail |
|---|---|
| King unmoved | Still on e1 or e8 |
| That rook unmoved | The h-file or a-file rook |
| Empty squares between | No pieces in the way |
| King not in check | You can't castle out of check |
| Safe path | King doesn't cross or land on an attacked square |
The rook can be attacked and castling is still legal. It's the king's path that has to be clean. Kingside castling puts the king on g1 and the rook on f1. Queenside puts the king on c1 and the rook on d1, and b1 has to be empty as well, which is why it takes longer to set up.
The king in the endgame, where it earns its keep
I'll admit it: the king is furniture for the first fifteen moves of most games. Mine still sits on e1 longer than it should, and I've lost plenty of games for exactly that reason. But once the queens come off, the king becomes a fighting piece, and the player who walks it toward the action first usually wins.
King and pawn endings come down to the opposition, which is just kings facing each other with one square between them. Whoever has to move first gives ground. A king that reaches the sixth rank in front of its own passed pawn is often worth more than the pawn itself. Point charts handle this awkwardly: most either give the king an infinity symbol or skip it entirely, while in practical endgame play it fights like a piece worth about 4 points. The reasoning sits in this breakdown of chess piece values.
Two kings alone on the board is a draw. So is a king with no legal move that isn't in check, which is stalemate, and it has rescued more losing players than any other rule in the game.
If you need a set to learn on
If the goal is teaching the king's moves to a kid or a friend, the pieces matter more than the board. The listing details below are what I'd weigh before buying.
Spin Master Games Cardinal Classics Chess Teacher
- Includes: Chessboard, 32 Chess Pieces, Instructions
Each piece is printed with its name, direction and number of squares, which is about as close as a box gets to a coach leaning over your shoulder, and it includes the board, 32 pieces and instructions for ages 8 and up.
A folding cardboard board with standard flat-bottomed plastic pieces in the traditional shapes, listed for ages 6 and up, and I'd buy it as the cheap set that lives in a closet and comes out on rainy afternoons.
The listing gives a 3.75 inch king, 2.25 inch squares, a 19.75 inch vinyl roll-up board, 34 pieces with two extra queens, a carry bag and equalizer dice, and those numbers land inside the usual US Chess guidance of a king between 3.375 and 4.5 inches on squares of 2 to 2.5 inches.
Next step: clear the board, put a lone white king on e4, and count its eight squares out loud. Then move it to a1 and count three. That drop is the whole argument for walking your king to the center in the endgame and hiding it behind pawns in the middlegame.
Questions people ask me
How many squares can the king move in chess?
Up to eight from a central square, five from an edge square, and three from a corner. It always moves exactly one square per turn, so the number depends on how much room the board gives it.
Where does the king go when you set up the board?
The white king goes on e1 and the black king on e8, the middle squares of each back rank. The queens sit beside them on d1 and d8, each on its own color.
Can the king take pieces in chess?
Yes, if the enemy piece is one square away and nothing defends it. A defended piece can't be captured, because the king would be moving into check, and the enemy king can never be captured at all.