How to play Xiangqi

Xiangqi, or Chinese chess, is played by more people than almost any board game on earth. If you know chess you will recognise the shape of it at once: a king to corner, pieces with personalities, checks and mates. Then the river and the cannons make it entirely its own game, faster and more open than chess from the very first moves.

The board and the pieces

The board is a grid of nine lines by ten, and pieces stand on the crossing points, not in the squares. A river runs across the middle, and each side has a three by three palace marked with an X. Red moves first.

Each side has a general, two advisors, two elephants, two horses, two chariots, two cannons, and five soldiers. Chariots move like chess rooks, any distance along a line. Horses move like chess knights, one point straight then one diagonally, but they can be blocked: a piece standing directly beside a horse stops it moving in that direction. Elephants move exactly two points diagonally and can never cross the river. Advisors step one point diagonally and never leave the palace. The general steps one point up, down or sideways, and never leaves the palace either. Soldiers step one point forward, and once they cross the river they may also step sideways. They never go backward.

The cannon is the piece chess does not have. It moves like a chariot, but it captures by jumping: to take a piece, there must be exactly one piece (either side's) standing between the cannon and its target. No screen, no capture. Two screens, no capture.

How you win

Checkmate the enemy general and the game is over. And in xiangqi, unlike chess, stalemate wins too: if it is your opponent's turn and they have no legal move at all, they lose. Your opponent can also resign, and if their clock runs out, you win on time.

The rules that matter

The generals may never face each other. If the two generals stand on the same file with nothing between them, the position is illegal, and any move that would create it is forbidden. This has real consequences: a lone piece standing between the generals can be pinned to the file, and a general at one end of an open file quietly controls the whole of it.

Checking forever loses. In chess, endless checks force a draw. In xiangqi they lose the game. If the same position keeps coming round and one player has been giving check with every single move, that player loses. If both players are somehow checking each other on every move, the game is a draw instead.

Chasing forever is barred. Endlessly repeating a move that does nothing but hound the same piece is not allowed either. When a repeated chase is detected, that move is simply removed from your options and you must play something else.

Draws. A game is drawn when both sides are checking on every move of a repetition, when sixty moves each pass with no capture, or when so little is left that no mate is possible, for example two bare generals. You can also offer your opponent a draw, up to three offers each per game. On Dream Games a drawn game means nobody loses their stake.

How a match works on Dream Games

Both players put up the same stake, and both stakes are set aside before the first move. The winner takes 90% of the pot and we keep 10% as our fee. If the game is a draw, both players get their stake back in full and we take nothing.

Each player has ten minutes on the clock for the whole game. Your clock only runs while it is your turn. Run out of time and you lose, even if you are ahead on the board.

Try it

The best way in is simply to play. Practice is free: pick a bot on easy, medium or hard, or send a friend a link. Nothing is staked and nothing is recorded, so you can experiment as much as you like.

When you are ready to play for something, find an opponent in the lobby. You see the stake and the payout before you accept, and nothing leaves your balance until you say yes.