Mate in 3: queen to f8 (h6)
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The tactical motive
Mate in 3: a forced sequence that ends in checkmate.
Difficulty 1876 ShuffleRating — for advanced tacticians.
White 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 c1, queen h6, rook d1, bishop c4 d4, knight c3, pawn a2 b2 c2 e4.
Black: king h8, queen h5, rook a8 f8, bishop e7, knight b8, pawn c6 f6 g6 a7 b7 h7.
10 white and 12 black pieces are on the board; the puzzle position arises after move 22.
The position in numbers
Black are ahead by 4 points of material (27 against 31; pawn = 1, knight and bishop = 3, rook = 5, queen = 9) — the tactic has to convert or outweigh that.
The white king stands on c1, the black king on h8.
It is White to move on move 22, with 45 legal replies to weigh — only the line that keeps the advantage solves the puzzle.
White keeps 4 pawns, Black 6. Files fully open (no pawns of either colour): d — natural highways for the rooks and queen. Half-open for White: f, g, h.
White hold the bishop pair, an edge in open lines. The White king has 2 empty squares to step to right now — the fewer they are, the closer a mating net.
Solution & explanation
Main line
22. Qxf8+ Bxf8 23. Bxf6+ Bg7 24. Rd8#
Why it works
- Great move! queen to f8 keeps the pressure (#2).
- Well found: bishop to f6 (#1).
- Strong! rook to d8 is the sharp choice (#).
- The line ends in a forced mate in 3.
- If instead Bxf8, then Bxf6+ and you stay on top.
Move by move
- 22. Qxf8+ — queen to f8 (capture) with check
- Bxf8 — bishop to f8 (capture)
- 23. Bxf6+ — bishop to f6 (capture) with check
- Bg7 — bishop to g7
- 24. Rd8# — rook to d8 and it is checkmate
Types in this puzzle
Back-rank mate
The king is locked behind its own pawns — a heavy piece strikes the last rank.
The back-rank mate strikes a king locked behind its own unmoved pawns when a rook or queen crashes onto the last rank. The signs: no escape hole in front of the king, and the back rank guarded by a single piece or by nobody at all. Often that lone guard is deflected or traded off first, and only then comes the invasion. In your own games, make luft in time — one pawn move prevents a sudden catastrophe.
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.
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.
Provenance
Derived from the Lichess puzzle database (CC0).
Verified by Stockfish at depth 20+.
Solution forcedness confirmed (verified).
Pack 014
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