How to Rapidly Draw Bishop+King against Knight+King in Bullet or Blitz

In some ways this is a silly post because it addresses a situation that would never seriously occur in an over-the-board chess game. However, because of Lichess's adherence to FIDE rules in blitz games, there are occasionally situations where it is possible to lose on time in an endgame that is otherwise virtually impossible to lose.

One example of this is the king+bishop vs. king+knight endgame. This is of course drawn; the only way for either side to win requires a serious effort to bring about helpmate.

If you are stuck in a bullet or blitz game in a position like this and are low on time with no delay or increments, you can lose on time as long as neither the knight or bishop is captured. If you have the king and knight, drawing quickly is easy - just put the king on a different color square than the bishop and pre-move the knight back and forth.

The situation with the bishop is a little more complicated and requires a specific maneuver in order to achieve a draw by pre-moving. The key is to move the king to a corner with an opposite color of the bishop and then place the bishop at a knight's distance from the king.

Once this position is accomplished, the bishop may be pre-moved back and forth between c2 and b3 (in this case, or g6 and f7 in the opposite corner). Capturing the bishop immediately results in a draw. The only way for the knight to check the king is to either capture the bishop or move directly onto the square where the bishop is about to pre-move anyway, resulting in capture of the knight. Thus this position can be instantly drawn as long as the pre-moves are fast enough and there is either a repetition or 50-move rule.

It's important to remember that the bishop MUST stay at a knight's distance from the king! Moving the bishop adjacent to the king could result in mate.

Nonetheless, as long as the bishop oscillates between b3 and c2 or whatever squares are the knight's distance, white can pre-move his or her way to a draw.

One might think that a less risky draw could be achieved by moving the king to a corner of the same color as the bishop, since no mate is possible, and this would be true if there was an increment or delay. In a blitz or bullet game with no delay however, this could subject the user to annoying checks that run out the clock.