#2: Studying Chess Openings: 10 tips

It did for me for over 20 years—it was only in the last couple of years, thanks to the help of online platforms such as Chessable and Modern Chess, when I realised openings can actually be fun.

In this post, I'll be sharing 10 tips for learning and studying chess openings that should be useful for even those who are, like I used to be, not interested in openings at all.

1. One opening for each colour is enough

When you're a professional player, it's important to have several options in your repertoire (unless you're MVL), but at the amateur level, it's enough to know one well.

For example, GM Noël Studer wrote that he only played the French against 1.e4 until he became a GM, and I also pretty much exclusively played the Kan Sicilian (1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 e6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 a6) against 1.e4 for over 10 years, even after I became an IM (also check out points #7 and #8).

Rather than change your opening every few weeks or months, stick with one for at least six months or one year.

The experience of spending a chunk of your finite existence on this earth with one opening should also help you when you expand your repertoire later.

As you play tens or hundreds of games with one opening, you'll get the hang of the typical middlegame structures and battles that come up, and get a feel for how you can adapt the particular opening to your chess style (or vice versa).

2. Understanding over memorisation

If you memorise a whole opening book or course, you'll reach good positions in many of your games.
However, in the vast majority of your games, your overall chess ability and ability to come up with good moves will be more important than your opening knowledge.

At some point, your opening knowledge will inevitably end, and you'll be left to your own devices.
There won't be much point of reaching a good position if you have no idea what to do with it.
As you study and work on openings, try and understand the point behind each of your and your opponent's moves.

3. Practice over study

Think studying and playing through games are the best ways to deepen your understanding of an opening?
There's something better.

Even if you don't feel ready, start trying out your new opening in practice.
Like kicking a soccerball as opposed to reading about it, playing it is the best way to learn an opening.

To elevate an opening from crude knowledge to an actual part of your chess, spam games with it, not caring about losing.

In most cases, you'll take some beatings in the early days.
And that's a necessary part of expanding your chess arsenal.

4. Find some model games

When you're working on a new opening, find a number of model, or instructive games where that opening was played.

When you have these games, you can:

• compare your own games with them
• deepen your understanding of how the opening can be played
• learn typical piece placements and plans for both sides
• learn typical ideas and get a feel for the typical middlegames.

If you have programs like ChessBase or Hiarcs, you can do some uber-specific searches, but you can also study move orders in places like Lichess' Opening Explorer.

Other places to find model games are on the chessgames.com website: you can play moves on a board and see which notable games are associated with it here, or browse the library of game collections made by members.

Model games aren't necessarily those by top players or even masters—they might be by players around your level who have a style you like, or if you're rated 1000, the best games for you might be those by a 1500 player you found easy to understand.

5. Study miniatures

If you have programs like ChessBase or Hiarcs, looking for games which were quite short (say ~20, 25 moves) in that opening can also be useful.

You'll be able to see the typical:

• win conditions
• mistakes your opponents can make
• ways to develop your pieces and coordinate them for attack.

It's also useful to look at games in which your preferred side lost quickly.
In these games, you'll see some typical mistakes you can make, or some dangerous plans the opponent can aim for.

6. Build opening files

• When you find a opening you feel like you might want to stick with for a while, build a file with some variations and comments. They need not be complicated. You can consult and refine these files every time you play this opening.
• If you see a game by a player you like, or the opening stage of a particular game caught your attention, also store these somewhere. When you check these files or folders after some time, you might find that you've saved games from a particular opening and realise you're attracted to it.
• Even if you're not going to immediately take it on, when you've already planted some seeds of candidates in your gardens, it'll be easy to make a start.

These can be created in the aforementioned programs, or Lichess studies for free.

7. Diversification doesn't have to be broad

I mentioned it's good to stick with openings for some time, but there are some drawbacks when you exclusively play them for years (I've been there):

• you rely on that opening, and start fearing playing into any others
• you get accustomed to the pawn structures and general middlegame scenarios that arise from that opening, and don't get a chance to practice and improve on others
• since you're always playing along the same lines, your overall chess can stagnate since you're not encountering anything new

Learning a new opening doesn't mean you have to switch your serve from 1.e4 to 1.d4.

You can try out systems that are similar to what you already know: for example, going from a London (d4, Nf3, Bf4) to a Torre (d4, Nf3, Bg5) or Colle (d4, Nf3, e3), or going from a Kan Sicilian to a Taimanov or Najdorf.
Since they have some things in common, they're easier to absorb.
Once you're satisfied with learning a related opening, you're ready for a bigger change.

8. Expand your horizons every year

Even if you're going to play the same opening for years, add or try new variations every year.
It might be learning new openings for both colours, simply adding a new variation against the Caro-Kann as White, or being more conscious of castling earlier in your 1.d4 games as Black.

If you're always looking out to expand your repertoire, you're less likely to be satisfied with what you currently have, be more conscious of what you could improve, and be more open to change, which we all need sooner or later.

9. Study openings in a way that your overall chess improves

These days, with so many resources out there, opening work is easy to get started on, and it's easy to receive feedback from every game you play, so a lot of people spend a bulk of their chess time on openings.

Though I think it's more important for the vast majority of players to spend more time on other parts of their chess than the opening, now I understand why people get hooked on openings.

So there's no need to force yourself to only spend 10% of your chess time on openings, but you want to make sure the time you spend working on your openings is helping your overall chess.
For example, you'll be working on other areas of chess if you do one of these:

• study a lot of model games
• play through a lot of games by a strong player who plays the same openings
• play matches with your training partner in one particular opening.

Make sure the time and energy you're spending on openings isn't only making you better at openings, but a better chessplayer.

10. You do you

Some inspirational quote about your fleeting but unique existence as a person and chessplayer

Well, we only have this one life as a chessplayer, so above all, play what you love and enjoy.
We all play chess for different reasons, and opening choice is one way of expressing yourself.

If you're aiming for a high competitive level like grandmaster, I recommend you start learning main lines while your youth hasn't yet faded away, but otherwise, spend time on openings that you're genuinely interested in.

You know yourself best.
If you spend a long time studying an opening but find that it just doesn't fit your style, don't worry about it—finding out more about what you like and don't like isn't time wasted.

Spend your time on the things, and openings, you love.

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Originally posted Friday, 14 October, 2022 on juntaikeda.com