Guide
A glossary for the lobby screen
The words that turn up in lobbies and settings menus, explained without fuss.
The clock
- Time control
- How much time each player has for the game, often written as minutes plus increment, for example 3+2.
- Increment
- Seconds added to your clock after each move you make. It keeps long endgames playable when time runs low.
- Bullet, Blitz, Rapid, Classical
- Names for speed bands, from fastest to slowest. The exact boundaries differ from site to site, so read the numbers, not just the name.
- UltraBullet, HyperBullet
- Very fast formats in which a whole game is measured in seconds rather than minutes.
- Correspondence, daily
- Games with days per move rather than minutes per game. You move when you can.
- Premove
- A move entered before your opponent has replied, played instantly if it is still legal.
- Conditional premove
- In correspondence chess, a prepared reply to a move you expect. Lichess supports these.
- Vacation
- In correspondence play, extra time that protects your games while you are away. OGS supporter plans increase it.
Competition
- Rating
- A number that estimates playing strength and changes after rated games. Systems differ between sites, so ratings from two platforms are not directly comparable.
- Rated and casual
- Whether a game counts towards your rating or not.
- Arena
- A tournament with a fixed duration in which you play as many games as you can and collect points.
- Swiss
- A tournament with a fixed number of rounds; each round pairs players who have similar scores.
- Simul
- Short for simultaneous exhibition: one player takes on many opponents at once, each on a separate board.
Study and analysis
- Engine
- A program that evaluates positions and suggests moves. Stockfish is the best-known open-source chess engine.
- Analysis board
- A board on which you can replay a game, try other moves and see an engine’s evaluation.
- Study
- On Lichess and Lidraughts, a shared collection of positions and lines with notes.
- Opening explorer
- A database view showing which moves have been played from a position and how those games went.
- Endgame tablebase
- A precomputed database that gives the exact result of positions with only a few pieces left.
- PGN
- Portable Game Notation, a plain-text format for recording chess games and moving them between sites.
Games and variants
- Variant
- A version of a game with changed rules or a changed starting position.
- Chess960
- Chess with the pieces on the back rank shuffled into one of 960 starting positions, so memorised openings count for less.
- Crazyhouse
- A chess variant in which captured pieces change sides and can be dropped back onto the board.
- International draughts
- Draughts on a 10×10 board, with compulsory captures and crowned pieces that move any distance along a diagonal.
- Handicap (Go)
- Extra stones placed in advance for the weaker player, so players of different strengths can have a close game.
- Komi (Go)
- Points added to White’s score to balance Black’s advantage of moving first.
- Board sizes (Go)
- 19×19 is the full board; 9×9 and 13×13 give shorter games and are popular for learning.
Ways to play
- Turn-based, asynchronous
- Each player moves when they can and the game waits for them.
- Real time
- All players at the table together, usually with clocks running.
- Hotseat
- Several people playing on one device and passing it round. On Board Game Arena this is a Premium feature.
- Guest play
- Playing without an account, where a site allows it.