Commit e67cc97
Disservin
committed
on Feb 24, 2024
Stockfish 16.1
Official release version of Stockfish 16.1

Bench: 1303971

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Stockfish 16.1

Today, we have the pleasure to announce Stockfish 16.1. As always, you can
freely download it at https://stockfishchess.org/download and use it in the GUI
of your choice[1].

Don't forget to join our Discord server[2] to get in touch with the community of
developers and users of the project!

*Quality of chess play*

In our testing against its predecessor, Stockfish 16.1 shows a notable
improvement in performance, with an Elo gain of up to 27 points and winning over
2 times more game pairs[3] than it loses.

*Update highlights*

*Improved evaluation*

- Updated neural network architecture: The neural network architecture has
  undergone two updates and is currently in its 8th version[4].
- Removal of handcrafted evaluation (HCE): This release marks the removal of the
  traditional handcrafted evaluation and the transition to a fully neural
  network-based approach[5].
- Dual NNUE: For the first time, Stockfish includes a secondary neural
  network[6], used to quickly evaluate positions that are easily decided.

*UCI Options removed*

`Use NNUE` and `UCI_AnalyseMode`[7] have been removed as they no longer had any
effect. `SlowMover`[8] has also been removed in favor of `Move Overhead`.

Commit af110e0
vondele
committed
on Jul 11, 2023
Remove classical evaluation
since the introduction of NNUE (first released with Stockfish 12), we
have maintained the classical evaluation as part of SF in frozen form.
The idea that this code could lead to further inputs to the NN or
search did not materialize. Now, after five releases, this PR removes
the classical evaluation from SF. Even though this evaluation is
probably the best of its class, it has become unimportant for the
engine's strength, and there is little need to maintain this
code (roughly 25% of SF) going forward, or to expend resources on
trying to improve its integration in the NNUE eval.