A backgammon board set up in the standard starting position — fifteen red and fifteen white checkers arranged on the 1, 12, 17, and 19 points.

How to Set Up a Backgammon Board

The standard backgammon setup has been mathematically stable for nearly three hundred years — codified by Edmond Hoyle in his 1743 Short Treatise on the Game of Back-Gammon and unchanged in international tournament play since. Each player begins with exactly 15 checkers distributed across four points on a 24-point board. The opening pip count is 167 for each side. The setup is symmetric: both players' starting positions are mirror images of each other.

This page is the step-by-step setup guide. For the complete game rules — movement, hitting, bearing off, the doubling cube — see the rules pillar. For regional variant setups (Tavla, Hypergammon, Nackgammon), see the linked sub-pages at the bottom.

1. The Board: What You're Looking At

A backgammon board is a long rectangular surface divided into four quadrants by a raised central bar. Each quadrant contains six narrow triangular points (also called "pips" or "spikes"), giving a total of 24 points around the perimeter of the playing surface.

The four quadrants are:

Quadrant	Player's perspective	Contains points
Your home board	The quadrant nearest you, on one side	Points 1 through 6
Your outer board	The quadrant nearest you, on the other side	Points 7 through 12
Opponent's outer board	The far quadrant on your side	Points 13 through 18
Opponent's home board	The far quadrant on the other side	Points 19 through 24

The bar in the centre separates the home boards from the outer boards. Bearing-off trays sit on the edges of each player's home board.

Note on board orientation. Either side of the board can be designated as a player's home board — the convention is set at the start of play and is purely visual. Some boards have asymmetric inlays that suggest a fixed orientation; most do not. Either way, the setup itself is symmetric, so left-vs-right home board does not affect the position.

2. The Checker Placement: 15 Checkers in 4 Stacks

Each player places 15 checkers of their own colour on the board in the following arrangement. Reading the points from each player's own perspective, with point 1 in the corner closest to themselves and point 24 in the far corner across the board:

Point	Stack size	Where it sits	Strategic name
24-point	2 checkers	Far corner — opponent's home board	The back checkers
13-point	5 checkers	Middle of opponent's outer board	The midpoint
8-point	3 checkers	Player's outer board	Outfield anchor
6-point	5 checkers	Back of player's home board	Home-board anchor

Total: $2 + 5 + 3 + 5 = 15$ checkers ✓

The opponent's setup is the exact mirror. If you look at the full board with both players' checkers placed, you'll see two stacks at each player's 24-point (the back checkers of each side), two stacks of five at each midpoint, two stacks of three at each 8-point, and two stacks of five at each 6-point.

3. Verifying the Setup: The Opening Pip Count

To confirm you've placed the checkers correctly, count your pip count — the total distance, in pips (board spaces), required to bring all 15 of your checkers around the board and bear them all off. From the standard starting position:

$\text{Opening pip count} = (2 \times 24) + (5 \times 13) + (3 \times 8) + (5 \times 6)$

$= 48 + 65 + 24 + 30 = \mathbf{167}$

If your pip count comes out to anything other than 167, recheck your placement. The number is the same for both players from the symmetric starting position.

4. The Direction of Movement

Both players move their checkers around the board in opposite directions, from their own 24-point toward their own 1-point and off the board into their bear-off tray.

Player A (sometimes called the player on the bottom or "White") moves their checkers anti-clockwise around the board — from their 24-point through the 18-, 13-, 12-, 7-, 6-points and off.
Player B (the player on top or "Black") moves their checkers clockwise — from their 24-point through their own 18-, 13-, 12-, 7-, 6-points and off.

Each player numbers the points from their own perspective. Player A's 1-point is the same physical point as Player B's 24-point. This dual numbering is essential to remember when reading match notation — every move is written from the perspective of the player making it.

5. Equipment Checklist

Before play, both players need:

Item	Quantity	Notes
Backgammon board	1	Standard 24-point board with central bar. Tournament boards are 18–22 inches wide.
Checkers	30 (15 per player)	Disc-shaped, distinct colours. Standard size: 1¼ – 1½ inch diameter.
Dice	4 (2 per player)	Two six-sided dice per player, used with a dice cup.
Dice cup	2 (1 per player)	Required for tournament play. Standard manufacture; no internal grooves that would manipulate dice landing.
Doubling cube	1	Six-sided die marked 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64. Placed in the centre of the bar at game start.

For casual play, the dice cup is sometimes omitted (dice are rolled by hand). For any rated, recorded, or money-play match, both players use cups.

6. Visual Reference

Here is the starting position drawn schematically. The top row is the opponent's side of the board (points 13–24 from your perspective); the bottom row is your side (points 1–12). Numbers in cells indicate the checker count for the player whose home board is on that side. The bar separates the 6/7 boundary on each side.

   13   14   15   16   17   18  |  19   20   21   22   23   24
  ┌────┬────┬────┬────┬────┬────┼────┬────┬────┬────┬────┬────┐
  │ ●5 │    │    │    │    │ ○3 │    │    │    │    │    │ ○2 │
  │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │
  │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │
  │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │
  │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │
  ├────┼────┼────┼────┼────┼────┼────┼────┼────┼────┼────┼────┤
  │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │
  │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │
  │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │
  │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │    │
  │ ○5 │    │    │    │    │ ●3 │    │    │    │    │    │ ●2 │
  └────┴────┴────┴────┴────┴────┴────┴────┴────┴────┴────┴────┘
   12   11   10    9    8    7  |   6    5    4    3    2    1

(● represents one player's checkers, ○ represents the opponent's. Numbers indicate stack count on that point.)

Your checkers (●): 5 on your 6-point, 3 on your 8-point, 5 on your 13-point (midpoint), 2 on your 24-point (back checkers).
Opponent's checkers (○): the mirror image.

7. Common Setup Mistakes

Five common errors made by new players or players relearning the game after a long absence:

Reversing the midpoint stack and the 8-point stack. The 13-point (midpoint) holds 5 checkers; the 8-point holds 3. New players sometimes flip this — it doesn't change the pip count if both stacks are wrong by the same amount, but it does produce an incorrect position.
Placing 4 checkers instead of 5 on the 6-point. The 6-point is one of the two stacks of 5. Forgetting and placing only 4 creates a 14-checker position which becomes obvious within a few turns but is jarring.
Confusing the back checkers location. The 2 back checkers go on the 24-point (the corner diagonally opposite from where you'll be bearing off), not on the 23- or 1-point.
Setting up on the wrong side of the board. When playing against a partner, both players need to agree which side is "Player A's" and which is "Player B's" before placing checkers. If both players place their home boards on the same side, the setup will look symmetric but the game cannot be played from this configuration.
Forgetting the doubling cube. The doubling cube starts at the centre of the board, on top of the bar, showing the 64 face (representing the multiplier of 1 in the initial position). It is not placed in either player's tray.

8. Regional and Variant Setups

Several backgammon variants use different starting positions. Each is documented on its own setup page:

Tavla — Turkish backgammon. The principal form (Uzun Tavla) uses the same standard backgammon setup; variants like Kırık Tavla and Gül Bar use modified rules but the same physical arrangement.
Hypergammon — 3-checker speed variant. Each player starts with only 3 checkers on the 22-, 23-, and 24-points.
Nackgammon — Modern variant designed by Nack Ballard, with split back checkers on the 23- and 24-points to create more complex opening structures.

For the Greek Tavli variants (Portes, Plakoto, Fevga), the Portes setup is identical to standard backgammon; Plakoto and Fevga have all-15-on-one-point setups documented in the rules pillar under "Regional Variants."

For the Russian Long Nardi setup (all 15 checkers on the 24-point, strict blocking, no hitting), see the rules pillar regional-variants section.

9. After Setup: What Comes Next

With the board set up correctly, the first move is decided by each player rolling a single die. The higher number plays first, using the combination of both dice rolled as their opening move. Doubles on this die-each roll require a re-roll (in tournament play).

For the complete movement rules, scoring (gammon, backgammon), doubling cube mechanics, and match-play conventions including the Crawford and Jacoby Rules, see the rules pillar. For the strategic priority of each opening roll, see opening moves. For backgammon's broader mathematical foundations including the 167 pip count, see the mathematics pillar.