PolyGlot is a "UCI adapter". It connects a GUI interface (such as XBoard, Winboard, Arena or Chessbase) to a UCI chess engine. By specifying an opening book (in PolyGlot book format) chess engines can transparently use such books. PolyGlot understands the two main GUI protocols: UCI and xboard. Normally the protocol will be auto detected but this can be overridden in the configuration file.

In xboard mode PolyGlot fully translates between the xboard and UCI protocols. In addition it tries to solve known problems with other adapters. For instance, it detects and reports draws by fifty-move rule, repetition, etc ... It also supports Chess960. When in UCI mode PolyGlot mostly passes commands from the GUI to the engine and vice versa, except that it will play book moves on behalf of the engine when the occasion arises.

The engine options are exported as UCI options in UCI mode and as "feature option=" commands in xboard mode. The latter form an extension of the xboard protocol as defined by H.G. Muller. Options which normally appear in the [PolyGlot] section of the config file (see below) are exported as options with their name prefixed by "Polyglot". This makes it easy to filter them in the GUI.