How to get better at backgammon

Backgammon is easy to start and slow to master, which is a nice combination until you want to actually improve. Then the question becomes: improve at what, exactly?

1. Make sure you know what you're trying to do

Plenty of people play for years with a hazy sense of the goal. You're moving all fifteen of your checkers into your home board, then off the board, and your opponent is doing the same in the opposite direction.

Everything else, blocking, hitting, waiting, is in service of that. If the basics are still fuzzy, the 10 things to know for beginners covers them without fuss.

2. Stop giving away games

Early on, you'll gain more by dropping bad habits than by learning clever plays. Leaving checkers exposed for no reason, racing when you should be blocking, breaking up a good point because a roll felt awkward.

The 5 mistakes beginners make is the short list. Fixing those is worth more than any opening theory.

3. Learn a handful of opening moves

There are only 15 possible first rolls, and four of them have an answer nobody argues about. Learn those four and you'll start every game on solid ground instead of guessing.

What's the best first move in backgammon? has the lot, including a cheat sheet.

4. Work out when a risk is worth taking

This is the step where most players jump up a level. It's not about being bold or careful by nature; it's about counting the shots, weighing what the risk buys you, and checking who's ahead in the race.

Safe or bold? How to choose your next backgammon move walks through how to decide.

5. Learn the doubling cube

The cube is where games are won and lost, and it's the part beginners skip longest. Doubling at the right moment, and knowing when to accept, is worth more than any individual checker play.

The doubling cube: when should you double? is the place to start.

6. Judge your decisions, not your results

This is the habit that separates players who improve from players who just accumulate games.

After a loss, ask whether your decisions were sound. Sometimes they were and the dice went elsewhere. Sometimes they weren't, and you now know what to look at. Luck vs skill explains why a single game tells you almost nothing, and why fifty tell you a lot.

7. Play more, against someone who makes you think

Reading about backgammon helps. Playing is what makes it stick. Positions you've met before become familiar, and decisions that used to take a minute start taking seconds.

A regular opponent helps most, because you both keep adapting to each other.

The short version

• Get the goal clear before worrying about tactics.
• Cut the habits that lose games before learning plays that win them.
• Learn the four opening rolls that have a settled answer.
• Learn how to price a risk.
• Learn the cube. It's worth more than you think.
• Review decisions, not outcomes.
• Then play, often, preferably against the same person.