Chess, by the numbers
Where kings get checkmated, which piece takes which, how Magnus Carlsen plays, and which countries have the most titled players per person. And daily puzzles on the board.
👑 EndgamesChess endings a computer has solved. Guess who wins and how many moves to mate, then watch the perfect line.
♟️ Chess ShadeOne square is missing from a chess chart: captures, checks, where pawns die, opening moves. Where does it rank? Three rounds a day.
Chess around the world
Titled players for every million peopleIceland has 150 grandmasters, international and FIDE masters per million people, nearly double Serbia. The UK has 4.5.
How many rated chess players are women?Mongolia 33%, Vietnam 30%, China 27%; Denmark, the Netherlands and Sweden under 4%.
On the board
Where do kings get checkmated?1.6 million Lichess checkmates, by the square the king stood on and the piece that mated.
Magnus Carlsen's king goes for walksWhere his king goes, against everyone else rated 1800+.
Who takes whomWhich piece captures which, in 1.8 million captures. Pawn takes pawn is one in five.
Every capture, piece by pieceThe 32 pieces by their starting squares, joined whenever one took another.
Where Carlsen movesWhere his moves land, against strong online players.
How Carlsen opens with White1.e4 and 1.d4 swap the top spot over 23 years.
Data: the FIDE standard rating list (September 2026) and World Bank population; the Lichess open database (CC0); Magnus Carlsen's games from the PGN Mentor archive. Each chart names its source.