Is there any data on the fianchetto?

A recent post on this forum made me think about the fianchetto. Should I swear off it? I mean at least until I get a bit better at chess, if I even can.

What is the actual data on it? Are fianchetto castle positions lost more often than non- fianchetto positions? What is the data for white and black? What is the data for players of different levels (Elo or Glicko2)? Perhaps a poor player like me should learn more basic defence and attack systems first. Any thoughts?

You can compile such data your selves with chess database. Fianchetto is not good or bad it eihter fits into rest of the game or not.

And for quick research go into opening db in lichess and play few opening with fiachetto and look how people are doing. You can select rating range when look what lichess players. I am pretty sure that dragon sicilian is just as good amongs but you can easily find that out.

As @petri999 stated, the fianchetto is neither good nor bad in isolation - it's a part of an overall strategy that should line up with your pawn structure and other pieces. In such respect, it can either be helpful or a hindrance. It can be strong defensively, but still create weaknesses in your position - it's all about understanding what you're willing to trade in to further your positional goals.

It does give you control over the long diagonal, which can support play through the center to the opposite side, but you lose some flexibility in that your bishop can't be easily repositioned. You have to play your pawns accordingly - making sure you don't block off the scope of your bishop (at least without a pawn break to leverage, often your c or f pawn), and trading it off loses you an influential piece (and leaves you a hole in your castle, if fianchettoed on that side). Breaking up a fianchetto castle often involves trading off the bishop (with a queen-bishop battery) and an h-pawn push.

Ultimately, you'll have to decide whether or not you like the positions. In lower level games, it can often allow you to spear a rook (when your opponent overlooks it and blunders), or it can be misplayed where you lock it in. But play like that results from misunderstanding the position or tactical oversights and isn't a result of the fianchetto alone. Likewise in higher level games, it is a critical piece for controlling key squares in the position and supports attacking plans or keeping those squares unavailable for your opponent.

Fianchettoed bishops are a tad stronger and the basis of latent dynamism.

By the way, the ones on the King’s side are a tad better than the ones on the Q side. :D

Honestly, who cares what "the data" may be? Play what you want to play.

Well, for OP to gather that data it would be tedious. Better would be had there were options of generating data based on user preferred choice from the games.
Anyways, fianchetto is generally good but it depends entirely on position.

Some tips:

All the pieces (including the bishop) strongly depend on the structure you choose (structure means the pawns formation), then fianchettoing a bishop depends on your opening or defense.
Fianchetto is basically to put the bishop in the long diagonal, but what if the center is closed for example? There will be better diagonals in só many cases, it really depends on what the structure demands.

One of the chess principles is that you must fight for the center, and the classical way is to do it with pawns, to occupy the center with pawns. The modern way is to concede the center for a while to counterattack it later. The fianchetto option is usually associated to this modern concept, you'll get long term advantages by fighting for the center with pieces plus pawns striking the center together.
(Being modern doesn't mean it's better, the classical method is perfectly fine and possibly better in general).

Fianchetto works fine in many cases like 1.d4 in general like the Catalan Opening, formations against Queen's indian defense, Nimzoindian defense, Dutch Defense, etc and 1.c4 in general, It also work for many defenses like the indian defenses and sicilians. Openings with e4 like King's Gambit, Italian Game, Scotch Game etc are possible but it usually won't fit well, the same for some defenses like the french defense, the caro kann defense and others.

The fianchetto was developed in the 17th century, as the Sicilian Defense, with the purpose of having a more strategical and positional game, and the reason was to fight against the dominant attacking model designed by the italian school of chess, as known as romantic school, where your goal is to open the position no matter how to crush the opponent's King. So the Fianchetto was born to have strategical game, I think it's nice to know such an information, to shape yourself to the spirit of the original concept.

The answers are in the link below @Ikonoclast
https://lichess.org/opening?q=fianchetto

Thank you to @Toscani and @jose1122 for your answers. I am still at the stage where I make statements like "The fianchetto is rubbish!", when of course it is simply my playing standard that is rubbish.

In a recent video I saw the following illustrated. Picture a white kingside fianchetto position where the rook has left the f1 square and the opponent has made a battery of queen and bishop with bishop in front. Black pushes the supported bishop to h3. The video pointed out that capturing the bishop just brings the queen to h3, which can lead to all sorts of trouble as we know. But the video also pointed out that white can retreat the bishop to h1 avoiding trading it, reserving it for defence and not leaving the otherwise recapturing king on the more exposed g2. I thought, gee I did not know that and neither did I figure it out for myself.

In the game of Go (which I don't play although I know the rules), there are positions and sequences (often in the corners) called "joseki". It seems to me that properly handling a fianchetto position, at least defensively, is like doing a little corner "joseki". If you know the patterns and sequences to maintain local safety for the king this then helps you play the whole board well. If you see a battery danger emerging then moving the rook in a timely fashion (it usually needs to go to a better file anyway) could be a good preparation move.

Do people know other little tactics and stratagems for maintaining fianchetto position safety? It's easy to find videos on topics like "How to Attack the Fianchetto King" but not on how to maintain and protect the fianchetto king. Any other things I should know? At least, if I more fully understand the advantages and disadvantages of the fianchetto then I can make an informed decision on whether I want to play such positions.

@Ikonoclast said in #9:

Do people know other little tactics and stratagems for maintaining fianchetto position safety? It's easy to find videos on topics like "How to Attack the Fianchetto King" but not on how to maintain and protect the fianchetto king. Any other things I should know? At least, if I more fully understand the advantages and disadvantages of the fianchetto then I can make an informed decision on whether I want to play such positions.

Again it depends so much on the position, I'll leave one example:

Here black cannot keep the bishop in the game so castle is natural. But the fianchetto structure is there still, and white clearly wants to push h4 g4 h5 and ruin my castle.

My defensive method was to push h5 first because this way I avoid both h5 physically and also the g5 push, once I have 2 pieces and a pawn defending it, and even if he sacrifice the pawn only to open the "h" file, then I still have Rh8 to fight for the opened file.
At the same time, I will fight in the other side the fast I can to create for him some trouble too.
I lost the game because I missed a tactic from him, but I think it's a fair example for what you're asking.

Each position has it's own characteristics, what you should try in general is to avoid the opponent to open the files he wants, and if it's not possible, then you keep your pawns retreated the most you can because this way his attack will take more time to come, and while he tries to advance, you attack him to make his life difficult as well.