Chess Openings for Beginners: Five That Are Hard to Get Wrong
Three rules that beat memorising lines, then five openings worth knowing by name: the Italian, the London, the Scandinavian, the Caro-Kann and the Queen’s Gambit.
Updated October 26, 2026 · By Tiny Builder
Quick answer
Three rules beat memorising lines: take the centre with a pawn, develop your knights and bishops before your queen, and castle early. Five openings that follow them naturally are the Italian, the London, the Scandinavian, the Caro-Kann and the Queen's Gambit.
Opening theory goes twenty moves deep in places, and almost none of that matters to you yet. Below about 1400, games are won and lost on hanging pieces, not on move seventeen of a line. What follows is the little that is worth knowing.
The three rules that replace memorising
- Take the centre with a pawn. e4 or d4. A pawn in the middle takes squares away from their pieces and opens lines for yours.
- Develop knights and bishops, one move each. Knights before bishops is a decent habit, because you usually know where a knight belongs earlier. Avoid moving the same piece twice in the opening unless there is a reason.
- Castle by about move ten. The king in the middle is the single most common cause of a short, unpleasant game.
Two things to avoid: bringing the queen out early, where she gets chased around while your opponent develops with every attack, and pushing the pawns in front of your castled king without a reason.
Five openings worth knowing by name
The Italian Game (white)
e4, then the knight to f3, then the bishop to c4. Simple, old, and still perfectly good. The bishop points at f7, the weakest square in black's camp, and the position stays open, which means the tactics you have been practising actually appear. If you learn one opening for white, learn this.
The London System (white)
d4 and the dark-squared bishop out to f4 before the pawn on e3 locks it in, then a solid little triangle of pawns. The appeal is that you can play nearly the same setup whatever black does, so it costs almost no memorisation. It is quieter than the Italian, which suits some people and bores others.
The Scandinavian (black, against e4)
d5 immediately. They take, you take back with the queen, they attack her with a knight and you drop her to a safe square. It is the easiest answer to e4 to learn, because black dictates the structure from move one and there is very little to remember.
The Caro-Kann (black, against e4)
c6, preparing d5 with a pawn behind it rather than a queen. Solid, hard to attack, and it gives black a sound pawn structure for the endgame. Slower than the Scandinavian to learn, and sturdier once you have.
The Queen's Gambit (white)
d4 and then c4, offering a pawn to pull black's d-pawn away from the centre. It is not really a gambit, since the pawn is usually recovered, and it leads to positions where space and structure matter more than tricks. Worth meeting as black too, since you will.
What to do when they play something you do not know
| They play | Do this |
|---|---|
| An early queen attack | Develop a piece that defends, rather than panicking. Every move she wastes is a move you gain |
| A gambit pawn | Take it once, then develop and give it back if they get too far ahead in development |
| Something you have never seen | Follow the three rules. They are right in nearly every opening, including the ones nobody has a name for |
| A wing attack with the pawns | Strike in the centre. A flank attack is answered in the middle of the board |
Where the time is better spent
Puzzles and endgames. A beginner who can see a fork and mate with king and queen beats a beginner with ten moves of theory, every time. There is more on that in how to get better at chess, and on the finishes themselves in checkmate patterns.
In Tiny Chess Master the coach says what an opening move did, which is the useful half of opening study: not the name of the line, but why the move was played.
Questions people ask
What is the best chess opening for beginners?
The Italian Game for white: pawn to e4, knight to f3, bishop to c4. It follows all three opening principles at once, aims at the weakest square in black’s position, and leads to open games where tactics decide the result.
What is the best first move in chess?
e4 and d4 are the two strongest first moves, because each takes a central square and opens a line for a bishop. e4 tends to lead to sharper, more open games, d4 to slower ones. Either is a good habit.
How many opening moves should a beginner memorise?
Very few. Three or four moves of one opening for white and one answer to each of e4 and d4 as black is plenty. Below about 1400, games are decided by tactics and blunders rather than opening theory.
Should beginners play gambits?
Playing against them teaches you more than playing them. A gambit gives away a pawn for faster development, which is a fair trade in the hands of someone who knows what the development is for.
Why should you not move the queen out early?
Because every developing move your opponent makes can attack her, so you end up moving the same piece repeatedly while they bring out new ones. The exception is a line you have actually studied.
