Chess Board Size Guide

The official tournament guideline for placing chess pieces to a chess board suggests that the king s base diamter should be no more than 75 of the width of the squares on the chess board.

Chess board size guide.

The size of the squares on the chess board. The united states chess federation uscf states that square size should be anywhere from 2 inches to 2 5 inches while the king s height should be 3 375 inches to 4 5 inches. This is only a guideline and therefore there will be some chess sets that will not work with this chart. It states that the base diameter of the king should be no more than 75 of the diameter of the squares on the chess board.

Chess board guide when determining the size of chess board square that will work best for your chess pieces you need to consider both the height of the pieces and the base diameter of the largest piece which is usually the king. For over the board otb tournament play there are different specifications to keep in mind. These boards are small and best used for either smaller traditional pieces or the range of 3 tall theme chess sets. For example a king with a 1 5 inch base.

The overall size of the chess board. The standard uscf tournament set has 2 25 inch squares and a king s height of 3 75 inches. The chart above gives a range of chess pieces and chess boards. Chess boards with 1 1 2 square size chess boards with a 1 3 4 square size.

It uses the king heights and an approximation of the base diameters of the king versus the chessboard size. An example of this would be a square size of 6cm supporting a king s base diameter of 4 5 cm.