Scandinavian Defence
1.e4 d5 · you play black
2 chapters, 8 moves deep, get you to 94% of what you will actually meet. The other 1 covers the last 2%.
Course progress
0 of 104 decisions
0 still learning · 104 not asked yet
1 more chapter is below the depth for your level, together 2% of what you meet.
Drill this opening
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At your level
Level
Improving
Depth
16 plies of this opening
Chapters
2
Decisions
104
0/104
How this goes wrong at your level
Counted from 4,500,000 games by players in your band. These are moves that get played often and then lose — no engine was asked for an opinion.
What you are most likely to fall for
— the 5 costliest of 25
1.e4 d5 2.Nf3 dxe4 3.Ng5 Nf6 4.d3
exd3 — played 65% of the time here.
You score 37% after it, against 55% for everything else played from this position, over 2,018 games.
Instead:
e5
59%
h6
58%
Bf5
57%
1.e4 d5 2.Nf3 c6 3.d3
dxe4 — played 68% of the time here.
You score 40% after it, against 51% for everything else played from this position, over 1,810 games.
Instead:
Nf6
54%
Bg4
52%
e6
46%
1.e4 d5 2.Nf3 dxe4 3.Ng5 Nf6 4.d3 exd3 5.Bxd3
h6 — played 33% of the time here.
You score 16% after it, against 47% for everything else played from this position, over 663 games.
Instead:
Bd7
55%
Nc6
50%
e6
48%
1.e4 d5 2.Nf3 dxe4 3.Ng5 c6 4.d3
exd3 — played 50% of the time here.
You score 24% after it, against 47% for everything else played from this position, over 642 games.
Instead:
h6
57%
Bf5
56%
Nf6
46%
1.e4 d5 2.Nf3 dxe4 3.Ng5 Nf6 4.Nc3 Bf5 5.Qe2
Qd4 — played 31% of the time here.
You score 21% after it, against 51% for everything else played from this position, over 367 games.
Instead:
Nc6
58%
e6
53%
h6
51%
What your opponents fall for
1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Qxd5 3.Nc3 Qe5+ 4.Be2 Bg4
Nf3 — played 25% of the time here.
They score 43% after it, against 53% for everything else played from this position, over 809 games.
They should play:
d4
56%
h3
55%
d3
52%
1.e4 d5 2.Nf3 dxe4 3.Ng5 Bf5
Bc4 — played 15% of the time here.
They score 35% after it, against 51% for everything else played from this position, over 456 games.
They should play:
Qe2
60%
f3
55%
Nc3
53%
1.e4 d5 2.Nf3 c6 3.d3 dxe4
dxe4 — played 26% of the time here.
They score 49% after it, against 64% for everything else played from this position, over 468 games.
They should play:
Ng5
65%
Nfd2
54%
1.e4 d5 2.exd5 Nf6 3.Nc3 c6 4.d4 cxd5 5.Bf4 Nc6
Nf3 — played 33% of the time here.
They score 39% after it, against 66% for everything else played from this position, over 103 games.
They should play:
Nb5
79%
Bb5
44%
1.e4 d5 2.Nc3 dxe4 3.f3 exf3 4.Nxf3 Nf6 5.d4 Bg4 6.Bc4 c6
O-O — played 16% of the time here.
They score 43% after it, against 77% for everything else played from this position, over 64 games.
They should play:
Ne5
80%
Bxf7+
80%
Found by testing 94,688 decisions in your band’s games and keeping only those where the drop in score is more than four standard errors below the alternatives. About 3.17 of these would be expected by chance alone.
Your moves are chosen by the engine and checked against 3,439,091 games (Lichess Elite (2500+ vs 2300+), 2024-12 → 2025-11); their replies are what people actually play. Evaluations from Lichess Stockfish evaluations (database.lichess.org) (CC0 1.0 Universal), covering 86% of this course.