Open Sicilian
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 · you play white
3 chapters, 8 moves deep, get you to 91% of what you will actually meet. The other 2 cover the last 7%.
Course progress
0 of 371 decisions
0 still learning · 371 not asked yet
2 more chapters are below the depth for your level, together 7% of what you meet.
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At your level
Level
Improving
Depth
16 plies of this opening
Chapters
3
Decisions
371
0/371
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
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 Nd4 4.Nxd4 cxd4
d3 — played 23% of the time here.
You score 38% after it, against 52% for everything else played from this position, over 286 games.
Instead:
Bc4
61%
O-O
55%
Qf3
48%
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Qxd4 e6
Qc3 — played 7% of the time here.
You score 22% after it, against 49% for everything else played from this position, over 78 games.
Instead:
Qd3
56%
Qa4
56%
Qe3
53%
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 a6
Ba4 — played 4% of the time here.
You score 35% after it, against 55% for everything else played from this position, over 99 games.
Instead:
Be2
66%
Bxc6
55%
Bc4
49%
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 Nxd4 5.Qxd4 d6
Bd3 — played 4% of the time here.
You score 28% after it, against 56% for everything else played from this position, over 56 games.
Instead:
Nc3
58%
c4
56%
Bc4
56%
What your opponents fall for
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.c3 d5 5.exd5 Qxd5 6.cxd4 Bg4 7.Be2
Bxf3 — played 28% of the time here.
They score 11% after it, against 38% for everything else played from this position, over 156 games.
They should play:
Nf6
39%
e6
37%
O-O-O
35%
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Nxd4 g6 5.Nxc6 bxc6 6.Qd4
Bg7 — played 5% of the time here.
They score 3% after it, against 50% for everything else played from this position, over 35 games.
They should play:
Nf6
52%
f6
46%
1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 g6 3.d4 cxd4 4.Qxd4
Bg7 — played 3% of the time here.
They score 10% after it, against 53% for everything else played from this position, over 30 games.
They should play:
Nf6
56%
f6
41%
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 87% of this course.