---
title: "How Correspondence Xiangqi Worked Before the Internet · Xiangqi Master"
description: "Players exchanged moves by mail, recording each move in notation and waiting days or weeks for a reply, long before online turn-based platforms existed."
url: https://xiangqimaster.com/blog/correspondence-xiangqi-history
updated: 2026-09-23
source: Xiangqi Master (https://xiangqimaster.com)
license: CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/)
---

# How did people play correspondence xiangqi before the internet?

These answers restate the rules implemented by our open-source engine, which follows the WXF laws and is regression-tested against the official 110-diagram repetition casebook. Where an answer refers to a specific position, that position lives on the linked reference page, where the build verifies it against the engine before publishing.

> Direct answer
>
> By **mail**. Two players agreed to a game, each wrote their move down in notation on a card or letter, and sent it to the other side, waiting days or sometimes weeks for a reply before playing the next move. It is the direct ancestor of the online turn-based play common today, just carried by a much slower postal network instead of a server.

## Why notation mattered so much for this format

A postal game only works if both players can record and read moves unambiguously without a shared board in front of them, which is exactly what xiangqi notation, whether Chinese or the WXF romanisation, is built to do. See [reading xiangqi notation](https://xiangqimaster.com/rules/notation) for the system this depended on entirely.

## What the slow pace actually allowed

Days between moves gave players time to analyse deeply, set up the position on their own board, and consider replies they would never have time for in an over-the-board game. That same appeal, thinking without clock pressure, is what still draws players to correspondence and turn-based formats now, even though the mail has been replaced by a server. See [correspondence xiangqi today](https://xiangqimaster.com/blog/what-is-correspondence-xiangqi).

## Related questions

Does postal correspondence xiangqi still happen today?

Rarely, since online turn-based play offers the same slow pace with none of the delay or risk of a lost letter.

Was cheating a concern in postal play?

Less than today, since consulting a stronger player or a book was harder to police but also arguably closer to normal study than real-time engine use is.

## Related xiangqi resources

History of xiangqi

When the game was invented, and what is actually documented

Reading notation

炮二平五 and C2=5 — the same move, two ways

Xiangqi questions answered

Every question on this site, in one index

## Try it on a real board

Reading an answer is one thing; playing it is another. Free, instant, and nothing to install.