The evaluation graph

The evaluation graph is the map of the game. It lives in the analysis panel, Eval view (Cmd + Option + I if the panel is hidden). Each point is a move; the curve rises when White takes the advantage, falls when Black does.

The evaluation graph A game summarized at a glance: balance, swing, collapse.

Winning percentage rather than centipawns

Régence expresses evaluation as a winning percentage — “at this point, this side wins this position N times out of 100” — rather than in “centipawns”, the engines’ technical unit. It’s the same number used to grade moves: a Blunder is a move that makes this percentage drop brutally.

The practical benefit: winning percentage tells extreme positions better. Going from +8 to +5 “pawns” of advantage changes almost nothing (the position is still winning) — and the graph stays flat. The eye is only drawn to what matters.

Using it to navigate

The graph is clickable: clicking a point brings the board to that move. The most effective review method takes three gestures:

  1. Spot the steepest drop in the graph.
  2. Click just before the drop — see the position while it was still holdable.
  3. Step forward one move (→) to see the faulty move, then compare with the engine lines.

The evaluation bar

Along the board, a vertical bar shows the evaluation of the displayed position — white on top when White is better. It moves live during navigation: useful to feel the evaluation without taking your eyes off the board.

The time profile

Below the graph, the Eval tab offers a second reading of the game: the time profile — one row per move, with a bar proportional to the thinking time spent on it (light bar for White, dark for Black). Clicking a row brings the board to that move, exactly like the graph.

This profile tells what the evaluation cannot: where the game was played in your head. Long bars flag the positions that demanded real calculation; a blunder played in two seconds and a blunder played after three minutes of thought are not the same mistake — the first is a discipline problem, the second a calculation problem.

Thinking time is reconstructed from the clocks recorded in the game: the difference between two successive clock readings of the same player, increment included. The section therefore only appears when the game carries those clocks — which is the case for games imported from your Lichess and chess.com accounts via the monthly archives, and for PGN files carrying the [%clk] directive.