Exeter Chess Club

Standard ECO annotation symbols
with ASCII representations

[Table of symbols]

And now the same thing for text-only browsers (Tilburg character mappings):


 Symbol      Suggested ASCII     Meaning                                   
    Ø              1-0           Black resigns (White wins)                
    Ù              0-1           White resigns (Black wins)                
   Ú-Ú           1/2-1/2         Draw agreed                               
    !               !            Good or best move                         
    ?               ?            Bad move or mistake                       
   (?)             (?)           Questionable                              
   !?               !?           Interesting (risky)                       
   ?!               ?!           Dubious (too risky)                       
   !!               !!           Excellent or brilliant move               
   ??               ??           Blunder                                   
   <<               +-           White has a winning advantage             
   +/-             +/-           White has a clear advantage               
[[threesuperior]]   +=           White has a slight advantage              
  deg.              &            unclear                                   
    '               ~            about equal                               
[[macron]]         =/&           with compensation for material            
[[twosuperior]]     =+           Black has a slight advantage              
[[opthyphen]]      -/+           Black has a clear advantage               
    ~               -+           Black has a winning advantage             
[[questiondown]]    #            centre (hash also used for mate)          
   reg.            =>/<=          with counterplay                     
    R               R            Various alternatives                      
    '               `            without                                   
    "               /\           with the idea                             
    *               or           better                                    
    ˜               BB           two bishops                               
    ™               Bb           opposite coloured Bishops                 
[[Atilde]]          =>           with  the attack                          
    Ä               ^            with the initiative                       
    Å               @            with a lead in development           
    Æ               O            with a space advantage                
    Ç               <<           Queen's-side                    
    È               >>           King's-side                       
    É               //           diagonal                              
    Ê               ||           file                                    
    Ë               ==           rank                                      
    Ì               zz           Zugzwang
    Î               x            weak point                            
    Ï              _|_           endgame                                   
    ƒ               ch           championship                              
    „               m            match                                     
    ‚               cc           correspondence                            

If you read PGN files you occasionally see odd annotations like $1 $2 $4, and so on: these are NAGs (Numeric Annotation Glyphs), part of the PGN standard, the relevant section of which has been extracted here.
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This document (symbols.html) was last modified on 6th Nov 96 by

Dr. Dave