Knight endgames are like king and pawn endgames. This rule of thumb was given by former world champion Mikhail Botvinnik, who observed that if a king and pawn endgame was winning, the evaluation would be the same with knights on the board. We can infer that protected or outside passed pawns can be a huge asset in knight endgames, because the stronger side can always offer to trade knights, and the defending side will need to retreat in order to avoid the trade.
If you are reading this instead of viewing a chess puzzle or game, then you must enable JavaScript on this website.
[Event "rated untimed match"]
[Site "?"]
[Date "????.??.??"]
[Round "?"]
[White "Unknown"]
[Black "Unknown050"]
[Result "1-0"]
[Annotator "David Hayes"]
[BlackElo "0"]
[FEN "b5k1/3p1rb1/p2Bp3/2Pnnp2/8/P1P4R/B1P3PP/3R2K1 w - - 0 1"]
[SetUp "1"]
[TimeControl "0"]
[WhiteElo "0"]
1. Rb1 Nf4 ( { Black can try: } 1... Bc6 2. Rb8+ Rf8 3. Rxf8+ Bxf8 4. Bxe5 Bxc5+ 5. Bd4 Bf8 { White wins with a large material advantage. } ) ( { Black can
also try: } 1... Ne7 2. Bxe7 Rxe7 3. Rb8+ Kf7 4. Rxa8 Re8 5. Rxa6 { White
wins with a large material advantage. } ) 2. Rb8+ Rf8 3. Bxf8 Nxh3+ 4. gxh3 Bxf8 5. Rxa8 { White wins with a large material advantage. } 1-0