En passant — French for “in passing” — is a special pawn capture: when your opponent pushes a pawn two squares on its first move and it lands right beside one of your pawns, you may capture it as if it had only moved one square. The catch: you have to do it immediately, on your very next move, or the right disappears.
It’s the rule that feels made up the first time you see it (it isn’t — it’s in the FIDE Laws of Chess). It exists to close a loophole. Pawns were given the two-square first move to speed up openings, but that let a pawn sneak past an enemy pawn that would otherwise have captured it. En passant restores the balance: the defending pawn gets to grab it “in passing.”
How it works
Three things all have to be true:
- Your pawn is on its fifth rank (the 5th for White, the 4th-from-your-side for Black).
- An enemy pawn on an adjacent file moves two squares in one go, landing right next to yours.
- You capture on the very next move — your pawn moves diagonally to the square the enemy pawn skipped over, and the enemy pawn comes off the board.
Notice your pawn doesn’t land on the captured pawn — it lands on the empty square behind it. That’s what throws people.
Why it matters
En passant only comes up a handful of times per game, but it can be decisive — winning a pawn, opening a file toward the enemy king, or (crucially) forcing a passed pawn to be dealt with. And because it’s “use it or lose it,” missing the window can cost you the chance forever.
Related terms
- Full walkthrough: en passant, explained step by step — with more diagrams
- Pawn promotion — the pawn’s other special power
- Stalemate — another rule beginners trip over
- The complete rules of chess
- Back to the chess glossary
Frequently asked questions
Can you capture en passant a move later? No. The right lasts for exactly one move — your immediate reply. Miss it and it’s gone for good.
Does en passant work against any pawn? Only against a pawn that just made its two-square first move and landed beside yours. A pawn that shuffles one square at a time can’t be taken this way.
Is en passant a real, official rule? Yes — it’s written into the FIDE Laws of Chess and works the same online and over the board.
Written and fact-checked by the Chess Lab Academy Editorial Team (AI-assisted, human-edited) · Rule verified against the FIDE Laws of Chess (Article 3) and Wikipedia; diagram checked with python-chess · Last verified 2026-07-13 · How we verify content.