PGN Format

The PGN-Format is a widespread standard file format for exchanging chess games files. A file may contain more than one game.

Example:

[Event "Paris"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "1867.06.27"]
[Round "?"]
[White "Steinitz, Wilhelm"]
[Black "Winawer, Szymon"]
[Result "1-0"]
[ECO "C01"]
[PlyCount "55"]
[EventDate "1867.??.??"]

1. e4 e6 2. d4 d5 3. Nc3 Bb4 {Winawer plays his variation.} 4. exd5 exd5 5. Bd3 Be6 6. Nf3 h6 $6 7. O-O Bxc3 $6 8. bxc3 Nd7 9. Rb1 Nb6 10. Ne5 Ne7 11. f4 Bf5
12. Bxf5 Nxf5 13. Ba3 Nd6 14. f5 Ne4 $2 {A square is opened for an attacker.}
15. f6 $1 g6 ({The pointes are} 15... gxf6 16. Qh5 Ng5 17. Nxf7 Nxf7 18. Rbe1+) ({and} 15... Nxf6 16. Qe2) 16. Qg4 Qc8 (16... Rh7 17. Rf5 $1 Nxf6 18. Rxf6 $1 Qxf6 19. Rxb6 $1) 17. Qxg6 $1 Qe6 18. Qg7 O-O-O 19. Nxf7 Nxc3 20. Nxd8 Rxd8 21. f7 Nd7 22. Rbe1 Ne2+ 23. Kh1 c5 24. Bxc5 Qe4 25. f8=Q Nxf8 26. Rxf8 Ng3+ 27. Qxg3 Rxf8 28. Bxf8 {Steinitz was known as the Austrian Morphy in these days.}
1-0

Arena can read Chess 960 games in PGN format.

The tag pair section should be separated by an empty line followed by the moves and there should be an empty line between the PGN-games if there are several in a PGN-file

"O-O" and "O-O-O" (letters) and not "0-0" and "0-0-0" (zeroes) should be used for castling and "Date" should be YYYY.MM.DD id est for example 2007.01.13 and NOT 2007/01/13 nor 2007/1/13 nor 2007-01-13 (ISO 8601) and the "Result" should be either "0-1","1-0" or "1/2-1/2" for finished games to avoid problems with PGN game parsing.