Mate in 3: pawn to g6 (g7)
li-06g3snaming tag (square·N)Opens in the app if installed, otherwise downloads the APK.
The tactical motive
Mate in 3: a forced sequence that ends in checkmate.
Difficulty 1611 ShuffleRating — for advanced tacticians.
Black to move — find the best continuation
How to recognize this tactic
In a mate in three every move must be forcing; the defender should never get a free tempo. Find the check or threat that herds the king, calculate the single defence to each, and confirm the net closes on the third move.
General method: before you move, list the forcing candidates — every check, every capture, every direct threat — and calculate those first. The solution to a tactic is almost always among them.
Position on the board
White: king h5, queen b8, rook d8, pawn c2 b3 a4 f5 g5.
Black: king f8, queen e8, rook e4, pawn a5 b6 f7 g7.
8 white and 7 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 44.
The position in numbers
White are ahead by 1 points of material (19 against 18; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on h5, the black king on f8.
It is Black to move on move 44, with 19 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 5 pawns, Black 4. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): d, e, h — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for Black: c.
The Black king has 2 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
44... g6+ 45. fxg6 fxg6+ 46. Kh6 Rh4#
Why it works
- Great move! pawn to g6 keeps the pressure (#2).
- Well found: pawn to g6 (#1).
- Strong! rook to h4 is the sharp choice (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 3.
- If instead fxg6, then fxg6+ and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 44… g6+ — pawn to g6 with check
- 45. fxg6 — pawn to g6 (capture)
- fxg6+ — pawn to g6 (capture) with check
- 46. Kh6 — king to h6
- Rh4# — rook to h4 and it is checkmate
Types in this puzzle
Mate in 3
A forced checkmate in three moves.
Mate in three is a forced staircase: each of your moves narrows the opponent's choices, and the third one ends the game. Look for the start among checks and sacrifices — quiet first moves are rare in mating problems, but deliciously sneaky. Keep the tree in your head: every defense gets its own branch. Do not stop calculating after move two — see the final mating picture with your own eyes.
Only move
Everything else loses — find the only move that holds.
An only move is a position where everything loses except one single continuation. You cannot play "by hand" here: run through fundamentally different defenses — run away, block, trade, counterattack — and discard the ones that fail. The hallmark of these puzzles is that the obvious moves lose quickly while the solution often looks strange. First understand exactly what the threat is — then the one saving move reveals itself.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 012
Similar puzzles
In your browser or in the Android app. Nothing to install · Free, no ads