Can a Pawn Kill a King

/ Moves, Pieces, Rules / By

Chess is a game that requires great skill and a lot of practice.

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Once you learn how a pawn works, you can start to understand a little bit more about the game. After all, your pawns are your first line of both offense and defense once you set up all of the pieces to start your game.

A fallen King chess piece next to a pawn

With the exception of knights, you have to start your moves with pawns and only pawns, and pawns can only move forward. A rule that applies whether they’re attacking or advancing. 

Can a Pawn Take a King?

If you’ve ever asked yourself this question. The answer is no. A pawn cannot outright capture or kill the opponent’s king, as it can with the opponent’s other pieces.

Why? Because there are no pieces that can outright kill or capture the king. Instead, their only option is to checkmate or trap the king. In reality, this usually requires more than one piece since the king is usually able to attack or maneuver around a single piece with ease.

A fallen king on a chess board surrounded by pawns

Of course, just like in a lot of other games, there are some exceptions to the rules. For example, versatile pieces such as the queen, in some cases, can box the king against the board’s edge in such a way that a checkmate occurs. So if you’ve ever wondered if a pawn can take a king, now you have your answer.

Can a Pawn Take a Queen?

There are certain circumstances when a pawn is able to take a queen. In fact, there are two ways that a pawn can take a queen, and here they are:

  • When its king is not in check
  • When its king is already in check. However, you can only do so at this point if the action will put the king out of check
A pawn taking a Queen

In fact, in the game of chess you have three ways to take the king out of check:

  1. By keeping one of your pieces between the king, thereby blocking the check, and attacking the chess piece
  2. By moving the king to a “safer” square
  3. By capturing that piece that is giving check
A pawn knock a king off the chess board

By contrast, if you’re wondering when a pawn is unable to take the queen. Just know that this is the case when:

  1. Its king is already in check, and when capturing the queen won’t take the king out of check
  2. Capturing the queen will put its king in check
A white Pawn and Black Queen on a chess board

So, as you can see. There are certain times when a pawn can take a queen and times when a pawn cannot take a queen.

When you’re first learning chess, these rules might be a bit difficult to follow. But once you get used to them and you keep playing more games, it’ll become much clearer to learn which is which.

Can a Pawn Checkmate a King on Its Own?

A pawn can checkmate a king, but it requires certain scenarios to already be in place.

For instance, a pawn can only checkmate a king in conjunction with one or more other pieces. And they have to protect the pawn from being captured by the king.

In addition, one or more enemy pieces must be placed near the king so that it cannot have any other way to escape. Because of this, if the pawn places the king in check and that king is surrounded by his own pieces. (making his only move to capture the pawn). And if there is not an enemy piece in a position to capture that pawn, plus the pawn is actually protected from capture by any of its own pieces. Then the pawn has officially checkmated the king.

A king with rows of pawns on a chessboard

Phew! Sounds complicated, doesn’t it? It really isn’t. Especially once you learn more about what each piece can do and what they are not allowed to do.

It takes practice and patience, so if you don’t give up you’ll succeed. Just keep in mind that the pawn is never able to checkmate the king when it is alone.

Simply put, it needs the help of others to checkmate the king. And usually that happens with additional pieces, or promotion of the pawn, or even both of these things working together.

Can Pawns End a Game of Chess?

While it’s a little more difficult for a pawn to win a game of chess than it is some of the other pieces. It is still possible for them to do so in three different ways. These include:

  1. Pawn promotion. You can actually promote your pawn to pieces that are more powerful. But you have to reach the other side of the board to do this. If you want to checkmate, it’s much easier done with a promoted pawn than it is a pawn proper.
  2. Drawing a stalemate. If you’re at the endgame and neither you nor your partner have a lot of options to win. You can draw a stalemate so that neither party wins, which is better than losing. If you have a king and just one pawn, and the other player has their king. Then their king tries to take your pawn, you essentially can’t continue playing. Because of this, the game is over. This is because neither king is able to move into check and only kings are left.
  3. Working in tandem. If you work with other pieces, you can checkmate the king with your pawn. If the only moves the king makes are into other check forms to win. You can checkmate the king by making sure the other person’s king has no way to escape. You just maneuver your pawn’s position as it relates to the queen, rook, or another piece.
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Jenna Ostria
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