Resignation

A player resigns by clearly declaring that they will not continue the game. Checkmate, the situation in which the king is attacked and no legal reply exists, does not need to be played out: an unambiguous resignation ends the game immediately. Online this is usually done with a dedicated button; in a game played in person, it should be communicated clearly.

The normal result is a loss for the resigning player. The official rules contain a rare exception: if the opponent cannot checkmate through any possible sequence of legal moves, the result is a draw, meaning the game ends without a winner. The question is not whether mate is likely or easy, but whether any legal sequence could produce it.

Resignation is voluntary. It differs from a forfeit, which an arbiter or regulation imposes for an absence or infringement, and from a draw offer, which ends the game only if the opponent accepts.

Because the game ends when the declaration is made, resignation should be communicated without ambiguous gestures. Before resigning, a player can still check for a forced drawing resource, such as threefold repetition, when the same position appears three times with the same legal possibilities, or a position in which the player to move is not in check but has no legal move.