ChessBase Tips for beginners - How to add variations

Anastasia Corotcova explains how to create, manage, and organize variations in ChessBase when analysing games. It shows how to promote side lines to the main line, correct incorrect continuations, and safely replace moves. Finally, it demonstrates how to insert missing moves so game notation stays clear, accurate, and well-structured.

00:00 – What this lesson covers
00:13 – Creating a new variation from any position
00:34 – The variation dialogue box explained
00:47 – Choosing “New variation” correctly
00:53 – Adding variations without a dialogue box
01:03 – Why keeping a move as a variation is useful
01:16 – Promoting a variation to the main line
01:36 – Correcting an incorrect line in the game
01:55 – Using “Exchange moves” safely
02:10 – Inserting missing moves into a game
02:28 – “Insert into game” explained
02:46 – Key takeaway: clean and organized notation

Anastasia Corotcova is a chess player from Moldova who actively played and trained until starting university, around which time she also obtained her first FIDE Arbiter license. She has a background in computer science and has been working professionally in IT for the past seven years, which is her main occupation today. Alongside this, she contributes educational chess content for ChessBase and previously hosted an educational TV program for children.