Chess pieces, or chessmen, are the pieces deployed on a chessboard to play the game of chess. The pieces vary in capabilities, giving them different values in the game. For a standard chess game each player starts with:

One side of the chess set is referred to as "White" and the other as "Black" (White and Black in chess). To distinguish between the two, the black pieces are darker than the white pieces, and the colors need not be pure black or white. The Staunton chess set is the standard style for tournament or casual play. There are many chess variants and certain kinds of chess problems that call for non-standard fairy pieces.

In chess, the word "piece" has three meanings, depending on the context.

The context should make the intended meaning clear (Burgess 2009:523) (Hooper & Whyld 1992:307).

Each piece moves in a different way.

Pieces other than the pawn capture in the same way that they move. A capturing piece replaces the opposing piece on its square, except for an en passant capture. A captured piece is removed from the board. Only one piece may occupy a given square. Except for castling and the knight's move, a piece may not jump over another piece (Just & Burg 2003:13–16).