What is an anchor in backgammon?

An anchor is a point you occupy with two or more checkers inside your opponent's home board. It gives your back checkers a safe base that cannot be hit, guarantees a landing spot when you re-enter from the bar, and keeps your game alive even when you fall behind in the race.

What is the difference between an advanced anchor and a deep anchor?

Advanced anchors sit high in the opponent's home board or on their bar point (the 20, 21, or 18 points from your view) and combine defense with attacking reach. Deep anchors (the 22, 23, or 24 points) sit in the back, get shots later, and suit back games. Advanced anchors are generally much stronger in normal play.

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Anchors in backgammon, explained

Q: What is the golden anchor?

The golden anchor is an anchor on your opponent's 5-point (your 20-point). It is the best defensive point in the game: it blocks their best home-board point, attacks their outfield, guarantees easy re-entry, and can never be primed effectively. Early in the game, making it is usually worth fighting for.

If points are backgammon's currency, anchors are its insurance. An anchor is a point you own inside your opponent's home board, and it changes the character of the whole game: with one, you can fall behind, get hit, even get attacked, and still be fine. Here is what anchors do, which ones to want, and when to let them go.

What an anchor is and why it matters

An anchor is two or more of your checkers on a point in your opponent's home board (from your perspective, points 19 to 24, where your back checkers start on the 24). Because a made point cannot be hit or landed on, an anchor gives you three things at once:

Safety for your back checkers. They cannot be attacked, so your opponent's blitz never gets started.
Guaranteed re-entry. If you get hit anywhere else on the board, you always have a landing spot from the bar. Against an anchored opponent, no home board is ever fully closed.
A forward threat. Your opponent must eventually bring every checker past your anchor. Each one that crosses within range can be hit, which is the engine of the classic holding game described in our strategy guide.

The practical upshot: with a good anchor you can play freely everywhere else, taking sensible risks that would be reckless without one.

The golden anchor

The anchor on your 20-point, your opponent's 5-point, is called the golden anchor, and it earns the name. It denies them their single best home-board point, sits high enough to attack their entire outer board as they come home, and guarantees comfortable re-entry from the bar. A player with the golden anchor is extraordinarily hard to attack and nearly impossible to prime, since there is simply no room to build six points in front of the 20. Early in the game, when your opponent splits to your 5-point you fight to hit and take it; when your back checkers can split to their 5-point, securing the golden anchor is frequently worth a risk or two. Whole opening battles revolve around exactly this point.

Advanced anchors vs deep anchors

Anchors come in two families, and the difference drives strategy:

Advanced anchors: the 20-point, 21-point, and the 18-point (their bar point). These sit forward, where the action is. They combine defense with offense: shots at their outfield come early and often, your escape routes are short, and your racing chances stay alive. The 18-point is technically outside their home board, so it does not guard re-entry the way the 20 and 21 do, but its attacking coverage of their outer board is superb.
Deep anchors: the 22-point, 23-point, and 24-point. These sit at the back of the bus. They still guarantee re-entry and stop a closeout, but shots come late, often only against the bear-in or bear-off, and while you wait your race usually collapses. One deep anchor is a last line of defense; two of them, with the right timing, is a deliberate back game.

The general rule: the more advanced the anchor, the better, with the golden anchor at the top of the list. A deep anchor is what you settle for, not what you aim at.

Getting an anchor (and keeping it honest)

Split early, not late. The cheapest time to advance your back checkers is the first few rolls, before your opponent has builders trained on their home board. The longer you wait, the more dangerous the split becomes.
An anchor is not a parking spot. Owning the anchor does not mean falling asleep on it. Keep counting the pip count: the anchor's job is to keep you alive until the race or a shot turns the game.
Know when to leave. Run when the race swings your way, when a clean escape roll appears, or when staying means wrecking the rest of your position. Holding a beautiful anchor while your home board crunches to nothing wins style points and loses games.

Anchors and the score

Anchors also shape cube and match decisions. A solid advanced anchor is the classic backbone of a take: even when your opponent leads, the combination of re-entry safety and future shots keeps your winning chances healthy. And in match play, when the score makes their gammons valuable, an early anchor is the standard antidote, since an anchored player almost never gets blitzed into a gammon. Conversely, when you need gammons yourself, preventing your opponent's anchor becomes part of the attacking plan.

Build the habit with analyzed games

Anchor judgment, which point, how long, when to leave, is learned fastest with feedback. Every game on Backgammon Battles comes with free move-by-move computer analysis, so each time you hold too long or run too soon, you see the cost in plain numbers. A few weeks of that and the anchor decisions that used to feel like guesses become automatic.

Drop anchor, then drop the hammer.

Free ranked matches with provably fair dice, plus free analysis that grades every anchor you make, hold, or abandon.

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Frequently asked questions

What is an anchor?

A point you own with two or more checkers in your opponent's home board. It protects your back checkers, guarantees re-entry from the bar, and threatens their checkers as they come home.

What is the golden anchor?

An anchor on your opponent's 5-point, your 20-point. It is the strongest defensive point in the game and makes you nearly impossible to attack or prime.

Advanced vs deep anchors?

Advanced anchors (20, 21, 18) combine defense with early attacking chances. Deep anchors (22, 23, 24) get shots late and suit back games. Prefer advanced when you have the choice.

Build a game plan around your anchor →

When two deep anchors become a back game →