How to find the best move
- Move the pieces to reach your position, or paste a FEN or PGN under the board. It loads the moment it is pasted.
- Check the side to move. This is the single most common mistake: the same position with the other player to move usually has a completely different answer.
- Read the three cards: the best move first, then the next two. Tap a card to play that move and see what comes next. Every move you make on the board gets a fresh answer on its own.
There is no account, no sign in, and no limit on how many positions you can check. Nothing on this page is gated.
Reading the answer
The top card is the move the engine would play. The number beside it is the evaluation after that move, measured in pawns and always from White's point of view, so +1.4 means White is better by about a pawn and a half, and -0.6 means Black is slightly better. M3 means forced mate in three.
Useful reference points for a club player: under 0.5 in either direction is effectively equal and the game is still a game. Around 1.5 the better side should convert with accurate play. Past 3.0 the position is usually decided, though plenty of games at that score are still lost by the side that is winning.
Why you see three moves, not one
A single best move hides the thing you actually want to know: how much worse everything else is. When the top three moves all evaluate within about a fifth of a pawn of each other, the position is a matter of taste and your own move was probably fine. When the best move is a pawn clear of the second, something concrete is happening, usually a tactic, and missing it cost real material.
Strong players call this candidate move thinking. Before you look at the answer, name your own two or three candidates. Then compare.
Knowing the move is not enough
A best move calculator answers this position. It does nothing for the next one. The players who improve fastest use an engine backwards: they play the move they think is right, then check, and the gap between the two is the lesson.
That gap is also the thing worth tracking. One position tells you nothing; thirty games tell you that you keep missing the same idea. Chess DNA sorts your mistakes into nine weakness themes, including missed forks, missed pins, back rank weakness and hanging pieces, so the pattern shows up instead of hiding one game at a time. To check a whole game instead of one position, use the free game review, which runs the same engine on every move.
What depth should you use?
Depth is how many half moves ahead the engine searches before it commits to an answer. Depth 10 is quick and already stronger than almost every club player. Depth 18, the setting Chess DNA uses when it analyzes your imported games, is far more reliable in sharp tactical positions but takes noticeably longer in a browser tab. Start at the balanced setting and raise it when the position is unclear.
If the evaluation swings a lot between depth 10 and depth 18, that is a signal in itself: the position is tactically sharp, and a human is far more likely to go wrong in it than in one where the number barely moves.
The engine is Stockfish 17.1, the same open source engine that powers analysis on Lichess and inside Chess DNA. It runs as WebAssembly in your own browser, so your position is never uploaded anywhere. The first search downloads roughly 7 MB of engine; after that it is cached and every later search starts instantly.
Frequently Asked Questions
What is the best move in my position?
It depends entirely on the position, which is why an engine has to search it rather than recall it. Set your position on the board above, or paste a FEN or PGN, and Stockfish ranks the three strongest moves with an evaluation for each, so you see both what is best and how much better it is than the alternatives.
Is this best move calculator free?
Yes. It runs Stockfish in your own browser, so there is no server cost to pass on and no reason to charge or to ask for an account. There is no limit on the number of positions you can check.
What is a chess calculator?
A chess engine with a simple front end: you give it a position, it searches ahead and returns the strongest move along with an evaluation of the position in pawns. This one uses Stockfish 17.1, which is far stronger than any human player.
Can I paste a FEN or a game from Chess.com or Lichess?
Yes. Paste a FEN from either site's analysis board, a PGN of a whole game, or a Lichess link. The position loads at once.
Does it work on a phone?
Yes. The board is touch friendly and the engine runs on phones, though a deep search takes longer than on a laptop. The first search downloads roughly 7 MB of engine, which your browser then caches.
Can I use it during an online game?
No. Using an engine during a rated game breaks the fair-play rules on Chess.com, Lichess and every other site. Use it on your games after they finish, or on positions you are studying.