Sente and Gote
Sente and gote describe who holds the initiative in Go. A move your opponent must answer is sente — you keep control and get to play again elsewhere. A move that lets your opponent take the next big point is gote. Learning to keep sente is what separates drifting from steering a game.
Play a game
No account required — start in seconds.
What sente and gote mean
When you play a move that threatens something big — a capture, a cut, an invasion — your opponent has to respond or lose more than the move is worth. That forced exchange is sente: you finish it and still have the move. Gote is the opposite: you play, your opponent is free to ignore you, and they grab the next large point.
Neither is bad by itself. You will play plenty of gote moves; the skill is knowing which of your moves carry a threat and playing those first, while the threat still works.
Why the initiative is worth points
Whoever has sente chooses where the game goes next. Over a whole game, a player who keeps taking sente exchanges and then plays the biggest open point again and again quietly builds a lead, even without capturing anything dramatic.
Keeping sente in practice
- Play your forcing moves (moves that must be answered) before your quiet ones.
- Don't answer a move that isn't actually a threat — take the big point instead.
- Save some sente moves for the endgame, where each one is worth real points.
- Ask before every move: "If my opponent ignores this, do I gain more than they do?"
Frequently asked questions
- Is sente always better than gote?
- Not always — a big gote move can be worth more than a small sente one. But when two moves are close in value, the sente one is better because you keep the initiative and get to play again first.
- How do I take back sente from my opponent?
- Play a move with a real threat of your own instead of meekly answering theirs. If your threat is bigger than what they were doing, they must respond, and the initiative passes back to you.
- Does sente matter most in the endgame?
- The endgame is where sente is easiest to count: each forcing move you keep is worth concrete points. But keeping the initiative helps in every stage of the game, from opening to fighting.
Ready to play?
Open the board and start a free game now.