How to Play Backgammon: Rules, Setup and Basic Strategy

The board and the goal

The board has 24 narrow triangles called points, split into four quadrants of six. Each player has fifteen checkers and they travel in opposite directions around the board. Your last quadrant, the home board, is where you gather your checkers before you start removing them.

The goal is to bring all fifteen of your checkers into your home board and then bear them off, which means take them off the board, before your opponent does.

How a turn works

You roll two dice and move by the numbers shown. You can use the two numbers on two different checkers, or on the same checker one after the other. If you roll a double you play that number four times instead of two.

You may not land on a point that holds two or more of your opponent's checkers. A point with a single opposing checker, called a blot, can be landed on, and doing so hits it.

Hitting and the bar

A checker that is hit is placed on the bar in the middle of the board. Its owner must bring it back into play in your home board before moving anything else, using a die roll that matches an open point. If every entry point is blocked, they lose that turn.

Hits are the main swing in a game, because a hit checker loses the whole distance it had travelled.

Bearing off

Once all fifteen of your checkers are in your home board, you may start removing them. A roll lets you remove a checker from the point that matches the number. If there is no checker on that point, you may move a checker down by that number, and if no checker is on a higher point, you may remove one from the highest point you do have.

Five ideas that help beginners

• Avoid leaving blots where your opponent can reach them. The risk is greatest when they have checkers a short distance behind the blot.
• Make points. Two or more checkers on a point are safe and block your opponent from landing there.
• Build several points next to each other. A wall of points is hard to get past.
• Hit when it is safe. Sending an opponent's checker to the bar costs them the distance it had travelled.
• Count the race. Add up how many pips each side still needs to bring every checker off. When you are ahead, play safe. When behind, you need hits.

A worked example: hitting a blot

Suppose your opponent leaves a single checker, a blot, four pips in front of one of your checkers. Any roll with a 4 on either die lets you hit it directly. A roll of 3 and 1 can also reach it, by moving the same checker 3 and then 1, as long as the point you pass through is open. The more combinations that reach a blot, the more likely you are to hit it, and the same is true for your own blots when you are the one leaving them.

This is why experienced players count the distance between their blots and enemy checkers before every move. A blot that is a long way from any enemy checker is much safer than one that is right in front of them.

Practise against the computer

The Backgammon game on ForgeFlow Games uses the standard rules described here and has four computer skill levels. Start on the lowest and concentrate on the hit-and-re-enter rhythm before you raise the level.

Common questions

What is a pip?

A pip is one step on the board, or one dot on a die. The pip count is the total number of pips each side needs to move all its checkers home and off the board. It is the quickest way to see who is winning the race.

Can I move a checker backward?

No. Every checker moves only in the direction of your home board.

What if I cannot make a legal move?

You lose that turn. This happens most often when a checker is on the bar and every entry point is blocked.

Is backgammon luck or skill?

Both. The dice decide what you can do on a single turn, but over many games the player who makes better choices about hitting, blocking and safety wins more often.