Endgame Theory: Opposition

King and pawn endgames are tough, and even high-level masters mess them up over the board.

If you can memorize some main ideas and positions, you’ll be able to find what to do in these positions.

You’ll start to see these ideas even when the board is flooded with other pieces still.

Opposition: Distant, Diagonal, and Indirect

There are four types of opposition and each one can be simplified to regular opposition if both sides are given more moves.

According to Jeremy Silman, “in such opposition battles, you want to have an odd number of squares between the Kings with the other guy to move!“

How Opposition Works in Chess

Opposition occurs when the kings are separated by one square.  If you can move and put one square directly between your king and your opponent’s king.

Normal Opposition:

Diagram 1: White to move has the opposition and black must yield to white in this situation.

You can also think about opposition more easily by looking at the color square the kings are on.  In this scenario, both kings are on dark squares so the opposition is easy to see.

The harder part is to understand when you will get to this position from far away.  If we break it down into understanding the color square you’re on, distant opposition is easy to see.

Distant opposition

Distant opposition occurs when the kings are an odd number of squares away on the same file.

To easily find out who has the opposition, look at the color squares the kings are on. If they are the same color and it is your opponent’s move, you have the opposition.

To easily find out who has the opposition, look at the color squares the kings are on. If they are the same color and it is your opponent’s move, you have the opposition.

  White to move does not have the opposition since the square d2 is a different color as the black king.

Distant opposition works on the same file, but to determine what to do if your opponent is on the same diagonal as you, we need to move on to diagonal opposition.

Diagonal Opposition

Diagonal opposition is the same as regular opposition, but the kings are one space away diagonally.

You can use it to your advantage in situations where you need to infiltrate a pawn weakness.

White has the diagonal opposition and black must give way. This allows white to force the king away from the pawn.

In this scenario, black can play ke8, but white would maintain the opposition with ke6.  If black moves to kd8, then white wins the pawn with kf7.

If black moves to kg8, white moves to kd7, and the black king slowly runs out of moves to protect the pawn’s promotion.

We can also see distant diagonal opposition if the kings are multiple files away from each other.

Distant diagonal opposition.  Whoever has the move does not have the opposition.

Indirect Opposition

Since not every scenario will show both kings on the same files or diagonals, there needs to be another way to think through how to approach opposition.

You can also maintain the opposition with indirect opposition by making a rectangle.

White to move and maintain opposition

The key here is to remember what we’ve learned so far.

To maintain opposition, you need to make sure your kings are on the same colored square with your move

You also need an odd number of squares between your kings.

In order to close the gap and maintain opposition, the correct move is ka2.  Keep the diagram below in your mind.

White should try to force his way towards our other examples of opposition by the following means:

Ka2 Kf8 2. Kb2 Ke8 3. Kc2 Kf8 4. Kd2 Kg8 5. Ke2 Kh8 6. Kf2 Kh7 7. Kf3 Kh8 8. Kf4 Kg7 9. Kg5

Thus we have turned indirect opposition into our regular example of opposition.