The Top Chess Players in the World - Síða 5

SM Alexander Grischuk 2628 | #75

Alexander Grischuk is a Russian super grandmaster who is consistently among the world’s best players. While he’s an elite professional chess player, Grischuk is well-known for being one of the top blitz players. He’s a three-time World Blitz Champion, making him only one of two players...

SM Alexander Donchenko 2625 | #76

Alexander Donchenko is a German grandmaster. His two best performances came in 2019, when he first shared second place with GM Gata Kamsky at Biel Masters, one-half point behind GM Amin Tabatabaei. A couple of months later, he went undefeated and won the Barcelona Open, ironically beating out Kamsky...

SM Dmitrij Kollars

GM Dmitrij Kollars is a German chess grandmaster who earned that title in 2017 at the age of 17 years old. In 2021 he tied for first place at the Sunway Sitges Open tournament. Kollars is a regular in Chess.com events, including Titled Tuesday which he won on January 3, 2023. He also reached Division...

SM Ivan Saric 2623 | #77

Ivan Saric was born on August 17, 1990, in Split, Croatia. He is currently the highest-rated Croatian grandmaster (as of February 2021) and has been on Croatia's Olympic team since 2010. He reached his peak FIDE rating of 2703 in 2019. Saric won the Under-18 European Championship in 2007, a year before...

SM Denis Lazavik

Denis Lazavik is a grandmaster from Belarus and a participant in the 2021 Junior Speed Chess Championship. Born in 2006, he earned his IM title in 2021 and his GM title in 2022. He is rated 2560 FIDE at standard time controls as of November 2023, while his peak Chess.com blitz rating as of the same...

SM Benjamin Gledura 2620 | #78

Bio coming soon.

SM Etienne Bacrot 2620 | #78

Etienne Bacrot is a French grandmaster. He won his first French championship at 16 years of age, which is the youngest in history. That was the first of five consecutive national titles, and Bacrot has accumulated eight in total—more than any other player. He made a name for himself in chess as...

SM Andy Woodward 2619 | #80

IM Andy Woodward is a chess grandmaster from the United States. He earned his IM title in 2022 at the age of 12. On January 30, 2024, he earned his third and final grandmaster norm later becoming one of the youngest GMs in history after FIDE granted him the title at the end of July, 2024. Woodward...

SM Wang Yue 2619 | #80

Wang Yue is a Chinese grandmaster who holds three national championships: 2005, 2013, and 2024. He’s the first Chinese player to make the top 10 of the FIDE world rankings and the first to achieve a rating of 2700. For five years, Wang was the highest-ever rated player in Chinese chess history. Early...

SM Andrei Volokitin 2618 | #82

Andrei Volokitin is a Ukrainian grandmaster and two-time national champion. He won silver and bronze medals at the World Chess Championship in the under-12 and under-14 categories, and was part of the gold-medal winning Ukrainian national youth team at the Under-16 Chess Olympiad in 1999. Two years...

SM Vladimir Onischuk 2617 | #83

Full bio coming soon...

SM Eltaj Safarli 2616 | #84

GM Eltaj Safarli is an Azerbaijani grandmaster who qualified for the 2023 FIDE World Cup.

SM Saleh Salem 2616 | #84

Salem Saleh is a grandmaster from the United Arab Emirates. He has four national Emirati Chess Championships, three international Arab Chess Championships, and two Arab Individual Blitz Chess Championships. In 2015, he won the Asian Chess and Asian Blitz Championships. He has currently matched his peak...

SM Jaime Santos Latasa

GM Jaime Santos Latasa is a Spanish grandmaster who earned the title in 2018. His peak in the world rankings as of February 2024 is 59th, set in September 2022.

SM Pouya Idani 2615 | #86

Pouya Idani as a grandmaster from Iran who qualified for the 2021 FIDE World Cup.

SM Jonas Buhl Bjerre 2615 | #86

GM Jonas Bjerre is a Danish chess grandmaster. He began 2024 as the #8 rated junior player in the world, and the second-highest rated in Europe behind only GM Vincent Keymer.

SM Li Chao 2615 | #86

Li Chao is a Chinese grandmaster. He won the 2013 Asian Chess Championship and has had several top finishes in high-level tournaments around the world, such as his undefeated win at the Reykjavik Open in 2014. Li spent a considerable amount of time in 2015 and 2016 ranked in the world’s top-15...

SM Aleksey Grebnev

SM Peter Heine Nielsen

GM Peter Heine Nielsen is a Danish grandmaster living in Lithuania who is the longtime lead second for World Champion Magnus Carlsen. Prior to working with Carlsen, Nielsen was a second for the previous world champion, GM Viswanathan Anand. After earning the GM title in 1994, Nielsen became five-time...

SM Yuriy Kryvoruchko 2614 | #89

Yuriy Kryvoruchko is a Ukrainian grandmaster and the 2013 Ukrainian Chess Champion. That victory came after he defeated GM and former FIDE world champion Ruslan Ponomariov on tiebreaks. The same year, Kryvoruchko made it to the third round of the World Cup after a surprising win against GM Michael Adams...

SM Samvel Ter-Sahakyan 2613 | #90

Samvel Ter-Sahakyan is an Armenian grandmaster and the 2020 national champion.  He won the Under-10 and the Under-18 European Youth Chess Championships in 2003 and 2009 respectively as well as the World U-18 Chess Championship in 2011. Ter-Sahakyan won the PRO Chess League with the Armenian Eagles...

SM Georg Meier 2612 | #91

Georg Meier is a German-born grandmaster who now represents Uruguay. He learned chess at the age of three. He won the German Under-16 Championship in 2003 and became a GM in 2007. In 2011, he won the European Team Championship with the German team, scoring 5.5/9 on board two. Meier reached his...

SM Marc'Andria Maurizzi

Marc'Andria Maurizzi was born on May 16, 2007, in Bastia, France. In 2019, he won the French junior championship for players under 12 years old. In July of that year, he secured the IM title at age 12 years and two months. He scored his first two GM norms in Catalonia. In December 2020, Maurizzi placed...

SM Ferenc Berkes 2612 | #91

Ferenc Berkes is a Hungarian grandmaster and eight-time national champion. His impressive list of Hungarian Chess Championships took place in 2004, 2007, 2010, 2012, 2013, 2014, 2016, and 2018. Two years before winning his first national championship, he was the 2002 World Under 18 World Champion. He’s...

SM Vasif Durarbayli

GM Vasif Durarbayli is a grandmaster from Azerbaijan who qualified for the 2021 FIDE World Cup. He is a two-time Azerbaijani Chess Champion (2021, 2023).