Material Imbalance Display

To show the material imbalance display, enable it in the settings (see Show Material Imbalance) or in the Display Action Menu (see Show Material Imbalance). It will appear below the board or on top of the move list on phone displays in landscape mode.

The material imbalance display.

The material imbalance display shows the imbalance in a position regarding material. Unlike showing the captures of a game, it shows captures the other player did not make. This may be confusing initially, but the advantage soon becomes obvious: you don’t need to count pieces to know at a glance how the material is distributed.

Here’s an example:

Example: the material imbalance display during a game.

In this example, White is currently one knight and one pawn up, while Black is one rook up. You don’t need to know, for example, that White has captured 3 pawns and Black has captured 2 pawns. What counts is that White is one pawn up.