How To Solve Chess Puzzles | Improve Your Tactics & Visualization

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This video GothamChess does some Puzzle Rush survival mode on chess.com, where tactics become stronger in difficulty from Move 1. The process and strategy for solving chess puzzles in this video will be useful for beginners and intermediate players.
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[@asifrahaman8529]

Levy sees a chessboard for 0.5 seconds Levy: ahh the famous scandanavian trap

[@dubber1416]

Because it is easy to spot these kind of moves.

[@XDTrokts]

It’s awhhhh

[@XDTrokts]

Not ahhh

[@MrHamm1234]

The move at 4:54 where the bishop takes the queen... how does that win the puzzle? What is the main line to win the match from there? I wish it was explained because I can’t seem to find it.

[@surg3i]

@@MrHamm1234 your just up a queen for bishop. A huge material lead which you can use to eventually win.

[@maelstrom197]

"Checks, captures, attacks" brought me from 600 to 1000 puzzle rating in 24 hours. Listen to this man, he is a genius.

[@Freakschwimmer]

yep, same here ^^ I registered on chess.com after watching him and Hikaru for a couple of days and went straight to 1050 thanks to "Checks, captures and attacks"

[@monarier7200]

Thats not his idea tho, it's something everyone knows

[@yamanosu9463]

@@monarier7200 clearly not?

[@OliverSandys]

My rating before I used Checks captures and attacks was 350 but now it’s 1200

[@mockingbirrd1234]

I have 1800 puzzle rating

[@itwasinthispositionerinoag7414]

Step 1: Check for nasty discoveries Step 2: Put on Morphy head Step 3: Captures captures

[@rohithjacob4699]

Hey agadmatarinho

[@bahaaaddintaleb401]

Lol

[@xa-1274]

TAKES TAKES***

[@ReinaldosChessLessons]

Step 4: Captures

[@zhandrsaginov5825]

Where is the new video

[@thegorn]

17:35 and it was in this position, that IM Levy resigned the game, as there is nothing more to be done here. Black plays Bg5 and it’s just completely winning for black - Agadmator

[@shobhitagrawal7566]

Exactly Bg5 was very solid

[@Xoque551]

ERROR Levy.exe has stopped working

[@ricsouza5011]

Lmao he missed Qxe5+

[@santanubaral5203]

he was not playing a game he was solving puzzles

[@thegorn]

@@santanubaral5203 don't take my jokes too literally 😉

[@clashplaya8638]

Look for moves that’ll make levy go “That’s disgusting!”

[@elibright767]

26:03 “You’ve successfully found the worst move on the whole board” 😂😂😭😭

[@malingreenleaf1414]

The Gordon Ramsay of chess.

[@KirbzYyY]

As did I xD

[@pedrofellipe8028]

And I was so proud...

[@ethancollinsworth3927]

i was confused on this puzzle why don’t you just take the bishop before he moves his queen and then take the rook, rook can’t take because you unpin the knight and then knight takes queen and you are up a bishop AND a rook

[@ethancollinsworth3927]

OH YOU’RE IN CHECK IM SPED

[@winkwonk6828]

17:42 LITERALLY MY REACTION EVERYTIME I DO PUZZLE

[@AvonV]

chatter: "knight g5 looks good" levy: "knight g5 is literally the worst move on the board"

[@lucasariel3133]

17:42 for a moment I thought it was my internet connection

[@shivangitripathi7931]

Anish Giri brought me to your channel, really happy to be here...great stuff 🤘🏻

[@largenaq2935]

Did you know that once he was scrolling through the chess section of twitch looking for small channels and stumbled across GothamChess? He then proceeded to tell his wife that this guy is gonna be the next big thing, and now look where he is! This is a true story, you can even ask his wife! (But actually don’t ask his wife)

[@sjegannath6295]

@@largenaq2935 you might not believe me but I did something like that, I am no big chess player but I searched for good chess videos and most videos on top were trash, his channel was somewhere low in there, took a lot of digging and finally found it. He had 20k subs which is very less for his talent.

[@svenleutenegger2568]

@@sjegannath6295 i am following gotham chess since he has 300 subs lol

[@ronitkrovidi7156]

@Eni Gjinaj your comment was clever

[@charlesjohnfritz8119]

Can't sleep rn coz my stupid ass brain keeps wondering about how many times Levy said the phrase "Checks, captures, and attacks" to himself in his entire life

[@charlesjohnfritz8119]

Golden achievement unlocked: Say "checks, captures and attacks" to yourself 1,000,000 times

[@travisscott4421]

17:09 In this position the reason why gxh6 works because you make way for the queen to captures the e6 pawn and it gives a discovered check from the rook, if the king goes to h8 it's possibly mate in a series of moves.

[@null_pointer_deref]

Thank you, Travis Scott!

[@jacobkimm8563]

10:16 this man just turned into a bird

[@emilyh7632]

I nearly jumped

[@thomasstadler3279]

Love your content man, recently got back into chess and I've being struggling to improve until I found your channel. Every video you do I am able to learn something.

[@Time_X_1234]

17:09 In this position the reason why gxh6 works because you make way for the queen to captures the e6 pawn and it gives a discovered check from the rook, if the king goes to h8 it's possibly mate in a series of moves.

[@robertse4026]

25:55 me: NG5, NG5, NG5 levy: that is literally the worst move on the board me: yeah... yeah, thats why im 900 elo

[@leginamon3984]

Lmao

[@jabomb1262]

Lol

[@ZomboidMania]

come on I am 700 and I could still solve that puzzle

[@jadenchan3953]

As much as I loved the instructional value of this video, nothing beats witnessing the pure joy levy felt when he saw the wicked move at the end. This man absolutely LOVES the beautiful game of chess.

[@Mati-zc2ym]

17:35 The reaction XD

[@alexanderxyz6146]

I think this was one of my most favorite videos. (Also because pausing was fruitful, some kind of add which I usually didn't experience) It felt you were very natural and in a funny mood here. Then to err once and be mad about it made it more attractive to watch, and then the ice on the coffin is to analyze that one game, (and get mad about that golden Bf5 which was indeed godlike) and you even covered what to do if Kh7 which I wondered about (wonderful then I don't have to build it up here).

[@justinmorales1437]

people:slow down a lil bit give us time to solve *meanwhile hikaru speed solving puzzles

[@victormutuma3827]

Bottom line, he started like us

[@rohithjacob4699]

@@victormutuma3827 real bottom line : u must be fun at parties

[@victormutuma3827]

@@rohithjacob4699 Maybe

[@sangwiny4440]

Hikaru solves the puzzle faster than I can even figure out which color is mine. FeelsBadMan

[@victory7302]

@@victormutuma3827 false

[@OregonMikeH]

Lets just take a pause here to thank You Big Time for Your outstanding generosity to the Community! Such Host Demeanor and Generosity, Community Spirit along with Reasonable Charges for Excellent Instruction Courses needs to be recognized with the Might of Appreciation out here that is to rarely expressed. So, I'm expressing it now. Thank You & thank You Big Time for a most beneficial format mixing it up to the Benefit of all on the Team. I'm a lifelong hooked Fan. ... ps: Absolutely Love the Games shared between You & Erick, they are Outstandingly enjoyable!! ... Blessings to YA #1 from Oregon .. Mike, AKA Chess Barron.

[@VT_kannagi]

I've been working on my puzzles and haven't been doing very well. Thank you for the video. I'm going to see if I can properly study the puzzles now! I think I need to improve my eye for what happens on the board.

[@edwinjacobellis4852]

This video is great, I'm suprised I got so many of these right, I've been doin tactics puzzles an hour a day trying to get better 👍

[@limmykinh]

"Oh! I'm so bad at chess!" - Levy Rozman, IM ...then there's me who's stuck at ~800

[@kateyb9362]

me who’s still in the 200s 😂

[@Gamer-uf1kl]

@@kateyb9362 1 : Play the game Keep practicing 2 : Learn the checkmates Know how to checkmate with king and queen vs king, king and rook vs king, king and pawn vs king, scholars mate, backrank mate, two rook mate, etc. 3 : Checks, captures, attacks The thing mentioned in the video, look for checks then captures then attacks 4 : Scholars mate Many people would do the scholars mate against you. Watch gotham's stopping early queen attacks video to see how to prevent it. 5 : Opening Principles a - Control the center The 4 middle squares (d4, d5, e4, e5) should be controlled by you meaning you should have atleast one piece attacking those squares b - Develop your pieces Put all your pieces in the middle of the board (4 and 5 rank) except the queen because it is extremely valuable. c - Castle Just castle as quickly as possible d - Prevent Prevent the opponent from doing these (in no particular order)

[@AaaBbb-kw5em]

@@Gamer-uf1kl 6 : Google en passant

[@dinos0744]

17:37 I’m not sure if it’s correct but if you take the pawn with check, king moves to h8 and you take the pawn on e5 with the queen with check again, king moves to h7 and it’s mate with the queen on g7, I think

[@tipemotions]

Thanks Levy! Puzzles were one of my biggest challenges, after i watched this my solution rate went up from 2% to 80%

[@tizzlebub]

Most helpful chess video I’ve ever watched! Everyone preaches practicing tactics, but you’re the first person to teach how to solve them.

[@helgebrekke]

Loving the pivot from «Oh He wouldn’t have seen that!» to «Oh yeah maybe he would have» 👌🏼👌🏼

[@christianwarrior29]

More of these please, so helpful

[@marcosd3976]

on 17:35 .... gxh6 discover check, black goes Kh8, then Qxe5+ check, then f6 blocks the queen check, after that Qxe7 takes a free bishop

[@joemama0]

Thanks a lot Levy ....this video helps a lot in my game.

[@trimbotee4653]

Nice video. It is a lot of fun doing these puzzles with your commentary.

[@Time_X_1234]

Levy is so simplistic for his lessons, so that it isn't hard to understand, especially for beginners at chess it's actually easy to learn from gotham chess. Yeah! Levy!!

[@dramarent]

Thanks for this. Super helpful, dude.

[@ajarnray4115]

Great video thanks for making this!

[@erlanggawidyoh56]

I really like your videos bro, appreciate it !

[@YThursday]

Mate - watched half of your video, went and did my daily puzzles and got 100%! Thanks

[@adriansrfr]

Great presentation, perfect speed, very engaging!

[@calebgutierrez4447]

Failed puzzle 21 at 17:34 is pawn on g5 takes on h6 which opens the check with the rook on the g file. Then if king to h8, Queen captures the pawn on e5, king h7, Queen g7 mate. If king to h7 after the initial rook check then, rook to g7, king to h8, queen captures the pawn on e5 mate. There may be some bishop block in there depending on the sequence, but it still ends in mate.

[@johnathanroth6205]

17:35 I believe the solution is gxh6 check Kh8, Qxe5 check Bf6, QxBf6 check Kh7, Rg7#

[@adriancheung4824]

Love these videos, keep it up

[@iezioaudi22]

Really enjoyed this!!

[@skjorta1984]

i like how 'free queen ' was an entire puzzle

[@oliviercote-barclay6165]

Thank you, Levi. It helps a lot with my chess.

[@bibhabasumohapatra]

These streams are very useful , hecomes to the level of a beginner and its like we are playing, his streams gives us good results instantly.

[@katarinajones4306]

17:35 i came here thinking i was bad at chess but seeing levy making mistakes at the 20th puzzle like me gives me at least some consolation

[@GirlGeekLovesStampin]

If you have time in the future could you discuss puzzle impacts to the rating please? When I get a puzzle right I get 4 to 10 points in lichess, but when I get something wrong it subtracts 10 to 20 points. Thus seems to be fairly irrelevant to the complexity of the puzzle but I am a beginner trying to reach 1500 and hovering around 1400 now (for puzzles).

[@mathwizard296]

17:37 when I blunder mate in 1 on my first tournament match in a drawing position

[@justjenei3934]

Me casually when solving chess puzzles : *Stares at the other king*

[@MandyChessAcademy]

thanks for your video~

[@djdialjockey6262]

Deflection, queen sacrifice into horse fork, checked forced moves, etc

[@geogeo3733]

I just did 33 in puzzle rush today, that was my best yet.

[@shreykakkar4810]

Just a suggestion, maybe also advise them to consider the positions, like is there a backrank, hanging piece, etc.

[@ethanmitchell8626]

13:54 "there is BLOCC"

[@rajpatel5213]

Super cool video helped me a lot as usual

[@adityakharbanda3290]

thank you it was helpful .

[@thewinslows2]

While I love doing puzzles, I am quite a slow player. The problem with puzzles is this - if I treated every move like it was a puzzle, I would timeout every game. Of course with practice I get faster, and I try to tell myself, "look for checks, captures, and attacks" before every move, but by move 10, my timer is becoming an issue.

[@crazyinsanechessplayer2208]

"Protecting from escaping" - Levy 2020

[@mohdgaith2939]

Thanks levy enjoyed a lot

[@arun3122]

Can u make a video on nimzo Indian defence . Ur queens Gambit video has helped me a lot I win with it almost everytime.

[@arun3122]

Ya

[@AG-iy8nd]

Yesssss another puzzles video

[@srikanthtupurani6316]

I did not play much chess. I miss some simple moves. I played less than 90 games in my life.around 20 games I played with my relative. These were some of the games which were quite complex. They were not blitz games. I have seen some beautiful strategies and tricks. It is so entertaining and amazing. When we think about some puzzle rigourously we can get lot of new ideas.

[@sebastianl9631]

Very helpful!

[@jokersmith9096]

I think we need a showmatch: Teran Alvarez vs Levy :)

[@davidbatchelder85]

good one thank you

[@sunflowerglaxy6735]

I really liked the way you teach!

[@alexanderstewart5180]

33:18 this is still winning for levy as he can just take bishop with rook on g5 because the pawn can’t move or checkmate with queen surely

[@jeromemorgan9962]

Keep up the good work mate

[@raghavdhabe7359]

Takes works because rg7#, also if mh1, qxe5+, kh2 , qg7#

[@FizzleIsGaming]

15:42 is complicated to newer players cuz they might think they can take the rook with bishop with a discovered check to then win the queen but then they forget the white queen can just take your queen.

[@briandoile5011]

First one I missed. I actually saw your idea, but then tried to make bf3 for discovered check work, but now i realize that I can still lose my queen. Derp...lol.

[@aprokhozhy]

i love this channel, i genuinely got better at the game because of levy

[@MayureshKadu]

Useful. Thought I might have to watch this a few (hundred?) times to really get it all 😅

[@John-mc9hd]

This helped out a lot. I only picked up on trying to find a check while playing. After watching this video, I went from 1400 to 1800 in one day.

[@CaptGlorypants]

29:54 makes Danger Levels sound like a band name.

[@balthazarbeutelwolf9097]

I did get the puzzle Levy failed right, because I saw the Qe5 resource, that was not too hard. But the Bg5/Qf5 defence against g6 was insane - if you play this in an on-line game they report you as a computer cheater...

[@Eliezer4433]

Great video man

[@TheKrazyLobster]

Amazing content as always

[@tatomar001]

I love how he always pronounces the names as they would be pronounced in the person's native language, he totally nails it, even though this time it was probably 'Alvarez with an accent on the first syllable

[@antonioaguirre3989]

As a mexican I noticed that, it’s cool he puts the effort

[@danielcrase]

that puzzle at 17:30 is nasty as hell, i spent 30 minutes tryna solve it. and i still am not entirely sure why but i’m pretty sure it’s take the pawn, discovered atta k, king has only one move that doesn’t lead to force mate but get you set up for unstoppable mate pretty sure.

[@justinmorales1437]

thank you levy

[@artemis477]

17:30 because of Queen C5 and Queen G1 Checkmate. I think the point is to move the rook so that you can't be checkmated, to E1 maybe for free Pawn and Bishop

[@gummybearvitamins1211]

It’s mate in like 3

[@zacharyb.3298]

"What am I, Alexandera Botez?!" It's very rare that I literally LoL like this

[@thaumaTurtles]

19 was the first one I messed up on - I saw winning the knight but not the checkmate

[@Brightnight123]

Great channel !

[@greedow]

8:58 - What about Ke3? you make sure to take the pawn without losing the knight. and you can promote your pawn safely after that

[@Misteribel]

Ke3 is losing, because it allows the bishop to attack h7 timely, preventing promotion.

[@sparkoceanic]

15:36 I made sure to pause the video and try to find the solution. I managed to do this one myself!

[@legallyblind1041]

Well done

[@TheBusbyBabes]

but how do you adapt to that in open game? in puzzles i know to look for checkmates, in game i struggle with finding the right move and right moment

[@XDTrokts]

6:15 AHHHH SO DIFFICULT me in 0.1 seconds: Qxf1, Kxf1, Ra1

[@rachelfoster1078]

Great video! I used your tips and increased my puzzle score from 363 to 808 in three days.

[@disguisedcat1750]

You would have increased that much in 3 days anyway. No offense. You should thank him for igniting your love for chess

[@Turtel825]

I was 1800 (now i am 1700) in puzzle rating (lichess) while having ~850 rating in chess.com. It's not so easy to climb up to at least 1200 when you gain like 8 elo/win.

[@alexanderxyz6146]

13:20 well but there was a knight fork on g6 (after bishop f7)! Winning the rook. So that would have made me capture with the bishop. Of course a mate is better :-) Anyways I feel the puzzles should give half points for making the first move right, somtimes there are 4 follow up moves, it's harder to get them all right rather than just one, especially in a puzzle battle this seems unfair. perhaps you can give some feedback to the site to improve it, you seem to be working close with the site owner. Btw the explanation video is well appreciated, really great content.

[@extrom4716]

If your playing puzzle battles just look for a check and make sure its defended

[@prince1636]

what a genius 🤯🤯

[@nicholas2969ify]

Might be late, but at 24:55 he could’ve taken bishop, then rook, and depending on the person he could’ve had mate or the opponent’s queen

[@KirtiKumarKasat1]

32:45 is worth making into a GIF 😂😂😂

[@rookieman329]

levy is great GIF material

[@ramithair2846]

HEY Levy love you and your content, just wanna ask you since u teach chess, i am currently a 17-18 hundred blitz and 1900 rapid, my problem is my tactics are about 2250, is that normal do i need to work on time managment and strategy more than calculation and thanks

[@askamundsen667]

2250 is normal it just means you are good at tactics

[@stealthyshadow567]

17:26 I’m 2000 in puzzle and I paused and stared at that one for a good minute and felt like an idiot for not seeing the idea, glad levy took the hit for me.

[@sumantchopde9039]

Amazing! I can hardly do 10 puzzles in a rowon chess.com! Very helpful for me!

[@car2nboy09]

So at 17:30 the correct option would it have been pawn takes at h6, rook checks, king moves to h8, queen takes pawn on e5 check? Gained 2 pawns?

[@car2nboy09]

If anyone sees this ignore he goes over it in the end lol

[@S-Bbi-turbo]

That's nice!

[@Problem_Catur]

Good puzzle brother....👍 I Like ❤️

[@kcreview4937]

Can you make a video about the Polish opening? Nobody plays it in my ranking (800) Is it garbanzo?