Polish Opening: Symmetrical Variation
1. b4 b5
The Polish Opening: Symmetrical Variation is a chess opening classified as ECO A00, reached after 1. b4 b5. It is a line of the Polish Opening. White is to move.
In 12.6 million rated Lichess games (blitz and slower), this position was reached 691 times by this move order. White won 53%, 6% were drawn and Black won 41%. The most popular continuation is 2. Bb2 (68% of games).
Engine evaluation: +0.08 (Stockfish, depth 46; best line 2. a4 e6 3. c3 bxa4 4. Rxa4 Be7)
- ECO
- A00
- Moves
- 2 plies
- FEN
rnbqkbnr/p1pppppp/8/1p6/1P6/8/P1PPPPPP/RNBQKBNR w KQkq - 0 2- PGN
1. b4 b5
Analyse with Stockfish · Board image (SVG) · Open on Lichess
Results by rating
| Average rating | Games | White / draw / Black |
|---|---|---|
| 0-1499 | 354 | |
| 1500-1999 | 312 | |
| 2000+ | 25 | |
| All | 691 |
Most played moves
| Move | Games | White / draw / Black |
|---|---|---|
| 2. Bb2 | 468 (68%) | |
| 2. e3 | 57 (8%) | |
| 2. a4 | 37 (5%) | |
| 2. a3 | 19 (3%) | |
| 2. Nc3 | 19 (3%) | |
| 2. e4 | 18 (3%) | |
| 2. c3 | 17 (2%) | |
| 2. d4 | 11 (2%) |
Master games
21 over-the-board games are classified under this line (White 52%, draw 5%, Black 43%). The strongest:
- GM M. Amin Tabatabaei (2689) – IM Nurgyul Salimova (2409) 0-1 · Titled Tue 25th Jul Late · 2023-07-25
- IM Mark Timmermans (2404) – GM Xiangyu Xu (2611) 1/2-1/2 · Titled Tue 7th Jan Late · 2025-01-07
- GM V Pranav (2641) – IM Akram Khoder (2288) 1-0 · Titled Tue 20th Jan 2026 · 2026-01-20
- FM Martin Hollan (2349) – GM Vladimir Zakhartsov (2545) 0-1 · Titled Tue 6th Jun Late · 2023-06-06
- IM Edvin Trost (2441) – IM Aron Pasti (2402) 1-0 · Titled Tue 11th Jun Late · 2024-06-11
Search all games of the Polish Opening: Symmetrical Variation and its sub-variations
Highest-rated Lichess games
- Fraysinator (2692) – madcap_tr (2643) 1-0 · 2026-09-01 · 180 + 0s
- Saturnus13 (2408) – zyz7 (2481) 0-1 · 2026-09-02 · 180 + 0s
- SJZ_Jiazelin (2417) – Calapenos (2325) 1-0 · 2026-09-07 · 180 + 0s
Comes from
Polish Opening 1. b4
More Polish Opening lines (all)
- Polish Opening: Baltic Defense A00
- Polish Opening: Birmingham Gambit A00
- Polish Opening: Bugayev Advance Variation A00
- Polish Opening: Bugayev Attack A00
- Polish Opening: Czech Defense A00
- Polish Opening: Dutch Defense A00
- Polish Opening: German Defense A00
- Polish Opening: Grigorian Variation A00
- Polish Opening: Karniewski Variation A00
- Polish Opening: King's Indian Variation A00
- Polish Opening: King's Indian Variation, Schiffler Attack A00
- Polish Opening: King's Indian Variation, Sokolsky Attack A00
Opening names and moves from the Lichess openings dataset; statistics from the Lichess open database, 2026-09 (CC0), sample of 12.6 million games, bots excluded; evaluations from Lichess cloud analysis (all CC0). Master games from The Week in Chess #920–#1664 by Mark Crowther, used with permission.