What does "bear off" actually mean?

Bearing off means taking your checkers off the board altogether.

The whole game has been a race to get here. Bearing off is the grand finale: fifteen checkers leaving the board a few at a time, and sometimes with the result still in doubt until the last one goes.

First, get everyone home

Your home board is the last six points of your journey, the ones numbered 1 to 6 from your side.

You can't take a single checker off until all fifteen of yours are sitting in those six points. No stragglers, nobody on the bar. The whole team has to be in the house before anyone can leave.

Then the dice start removing them

Once you're all home, each number you roll takes a checker off the matching point.

Roll a 4, and a checker on your 4-point comes off. Roll a 2, one comes off the 2-point. Double threes gives you four 3s, so four checkers leave your 3-point, assuming you have four there.

You can also use a number to move a checker further in rather than take one off, which is sometimes the better play if it tidies up an awkward gap.

A high roll isn't wasted

Here's the rule that catches people out. If you roll a number higher than any point you still occupy, you bear off from your highest occupied point instead.

So if your furthest checker back is on the 4-point and you roll a 6, the 6 takes that checker off. Nothing is lost. Once the back of your home board empties, big numbers become your friends.

Can you still be hit? Only sometimes

Usually not. Once your checkers and your opponent's have passed each other, neither of you can reach the other, and the bear-off really is a formality.

It's a different game if your opponent still has a checker back: holding a point inside your home board, or waiting on the bar to come in. Then, as you empty your points, you may have no choice but to leave a lone checker exposed, and they get a shot at it. If they hit, that checker goes to the bar and travels the whole way round again, and since nothing can come off until all fifteen are home, your bear-off stops dead. Games have been lost one checker short of finished, which is why experienced players clear their points evenly and take the safe route even when it costs a pip or two.

The finish

The first player to get all fifteen checkers off wins. How much they win depends on how far behind the other player is:

• If the loser has borne off at least one checker, it's a normal win.
• If they haven't borne off any, it's a gammon, worth double.
• If they haven't borne off any and still have a checker on the bar or in the winner's home board, it's a backgammon, worth triple.

So the bear-off isn't just the ending. It's where the size of the result is decided.

And yes, that's where our name came from

bearoff is named after the part of the game where you finally get to take your checkers off the board. And you get to see if strategy and luck were in your favour.

The short version

• Bearing off means removing your checkers from the board.
• You can't start until all fifteen are in your home board.
• Each number takes a checker off the matching point.
• A roll higher than your highest point bears off from that point.
• You can only be hit during the bear-off if your opponent still has a checker in your home board or on the bar. Then one hit sends your checker round again.
• How many points you win is settled here: normal win, gammon or backgammon.