Chess symbols in Unicode

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Font depictions of Unicode chess symbols (in the same order as the table). 1st: DejaVu Sans; 2nd: FreeSerif; 3rd: Quivira; 4th: Pecita. Chess symbols.svg
Font depictions of Unicode chess symbols (in the same order as the table). 1st: DejaVu Sans; 2nd: FreeSerif; 3rd: Quivira; 4th: Pecita.
GNU Chess using Unicode chess characters to display a chess board in the terminal. GNU Chess on macOS.png
GNU Chess using Unicode chess characters to display a chess board in the terminal.

Chess symbols are part of Unicode. Instead of using images, one can represent chess pieces by characters that are defined in the Unicode character set. This makes it possible to:

Contents

In order to display or print these symbols, a device must have one or more fonts with good Unicode support installed, and the document (Web page, word processor document, etc.) it is displaying must use one of these fonts. [1]

Unicode version 12.0 has allocated a whole character block at 0x1FA00 for inclusion of extra chess piece representations. This includes rotated pieces, neutral (neither white nor black) pieces, knighted pieces, equihoppers, and xiangqi pieces. [2] Shatranj pieces have been provisionally assigned for a future version. [3] [4]

Unicode characters

In Unicode, chess symbols are in two groups:

The basic 12 chess pieces

Chess Symbols
Unicode.org chart (PDF)
NameSymbolCode pointHTML (decimal)HTML (hex)
white chess king U+2654♔♔
white chess queen U+2655♕♕
white chess rook U+2656♖♖
white chess bishop U+2657♗♗
white chess knight U+2658♘♘
white chess pawn U+2659♙♙
black chess kingU+265A♚♚
black chess queenU+265B♛♛
black chess rookU+265C♜♜
black chess bishopU+265D♝♝
black chess knightU+265E♞♞
black chess pawnU+265F♟♟

Neutral/Fairy chess pieces, xiangqi and shatranj pieces

Chess Symbols [1] [2]
Official Unicode Consortium code chart (PDF)
 0123456789ABCDEF
U+1FA0x🨀🨁🨂🨃🨄🨅🨆🨇🨈🨉🨊🨋🨌🨍🨎🨏
U+1FA1x🨐🨑🨒🨓🨔🨕🨖🨗🨘🨙🨚🨛🨜🨝🨞🨟
U+1FA2x🨠🨡🨢🨣🨤🨥🨦🨧🨨🨩🨪🨫🨬🨭🨮🨯
U+1FA3x🨰🨱🨲🨳🨴🨵🨶🨷🨸🨹🨺🨻🨼🨽🨾🨿
U+1FA4x🩀🩁🩂🩃🩄🩅🩆🩇🩈🩉🩊🩋🩌🩍🩎🩏
U+1FA5x🩐🩑🩒🩓
U+1FA6x🩠🩡🩢🩣🩤🩥🩦🩧🩨🩩🩪🩫🩬🩭
Notes
1. ^ As of Unicode version 15.1
2. ^ Grey areas indicate non-assigned code points

Chessboard using Unicode

8
7
6
5
4
3
2
1
abcdefgh

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References

  1. "Test for Unicode support in Web browsers".
  2. "Chess Symbols" (PDF). unicode.org. Retrieved 21 August 2023.
  3. Bala, Gavin Jared; Miller, Kirk (22 December 2023). "Unicode request for shatranj symbols" (PDF). unicode.org. Unicode. Retrieved 4 February 2024.
  4. Unicode. "Proposed New Characters: The Pipeline". unicode.org. The Unicode Consortium. Retrieved 4 February 2024.