You'll soon learn them if you don't have them. It also depends on if you're using it for proper games and if you'll be writing the moves down. It looks better without I think.
Buying Wooden Boards With/Without Coordinates
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I don't see how a player can spend much time playing over games in algebraic and be dependent on coordinates on the board itself, yet I've seen players put up a fuss when they had to play without them. Maybe they just use algebraic to write their moves down and no more, and never study.
I think to have coordinates on a nice wooden board cheapens it myself. If you need the help of coordinates on the board in order to record your moves or to go over games I would use one of the plastic/vinyl roll up boards with coordinates for this purpose. Such boards are used a lot in otb tournaments. I dont need the coordinates but I have been playing/studying chess for more than 30 years. I dont know any tournament players of 1800 or better that needs them either.
You do not want to have the coordinated on a board. For one the aesthetics are not as nice. Secondly you need to train youself to "know" the squares as it will help you think and develop as a player and have the coordinates there will never force you to truly learn all the squares.
I prefer playing on boards with coordinates, personally. Also, I don't think they cheapen the look of woooden boards or otherwise degrade the aesthetics, though that is just opinion.
I don't need them when I play, but I prefer to have them. It is comforting to have them for double-checking accuracy. I do stupid things when writing moves down like say e5 when I mean d5, or Qb6 when I mean Qg3. Having the coordinates just lets me double-check things more easily. It's nice to not have to think about double-checking that and just do it by sight. Sort of just a comfort feature in that regard, but still functional.
Just get what you want and don't worry about whether someone else thinks it looks "cheaper" or not. They can get whatever board they like instead.
A four year old thread? Oh well!
It's a personal preference; I don't like them. But obviously some people do as boards with them are out there. So choose whichever you like.
One advantage of a board without markings is that if you swap from playing or analysing from white's point of view to black's, you don't have to turn the board or swap sides of the table to get the markings "right".
I'm buying a wooden chess board trying to decide wether to buy a board with algebraic coordinates or without... My idea is that a board without coordinates might help me excercise my brain in location identification, so when I see a move i know in a second that this was Nf3 or Qd6 or Bg4 ....etc. While on the other hand coordinates can be plain helpful.
Any ideas?