2025 in chess

Timeline

January 2025 FIDE Rankings
Rank	Prev	Player	Rating	Change
1	1	Magnus Carlsen	2831	0
2	2	Fabiano Caruana	2803	-2
3	3	Hikaru Nakamura	2802	0
4	4	Arjun Erigaisi	2801	0
5	5	Gukesh Dommaraju	2777	-6
6	6	Nodirbek Abdusattorov	2768	-9
7	7	Alireza Firouzja	2763	0
8	8	Ian Nepomniachtchi	2754	-1
9	9	Wei Yi	2751	-2
10	10	Viswanathan Anand	2750	0

Jan 4 – World number one Magnus Carlsen married Ella Victoria Malone in a ceremony in Oslo.^[1]
Jan 8 – Vladimir Fedoseev won the Freestyle Chess play-in to qualify for the first event of the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour.^[2]
Jan 11 – 9-year-old Roman Shogdzhiev became the youngest player to score an International Master norm.^[3]
Jan 11 – Magnus Carlsen made his debut for FC St. Pauli in the Chess Bundesliga, where he played for the first time since 2008, scoring 1½/2.^[4]^[5]
Jan 17 – The President of India, Droupadi Murmu confers the Khel Ratna Award on World Champion Gukesh Dommaraju.^[6]

Tournament	City	System	Dates	Players (2700+)
Tata Steel Masters^[7]	Wijk aan Zee	Round robin	17 Jan – 2 Feb	14 (9)
Prague Chess Festival	Prague	Round robin	25 Feb – 7 Mar	10 (4)
GCT Romania	Bucharest	Round robin	5 – 17 May	10
TePe Sigeman & Co tournament	Malmö	Round robin	20 – 26 May	8
Norway Chess	Stavanger	Double round robin	26 May – 6 Jun	6 (6)
Biel Chess Festival	Biel/Bienne	Multi-stage	12 – 25 Jul	6
Sinquefield Cup	St. Louis	Round robin	16 – 29 Aug	10
Grand Swiss	Samarkand	Swiss	3 – 15 Sep	114
World Cup	TBA	Single elimination	31 Oct – 27 Nov	206

Tournament	City	System	Dates	Players (2700+)
GCT Poland	Warsaw	Round robin^[a]	24 April – 1 May	10
GCT Croatia	Zagreb	Round robin^[a]	30 Jun – 7 Jul	10
Esports World Cup^[8]^[b]	Riyadh	TBD	31 Jul – 3 Aug	16
GCT St. Louis	St. Louis	Round robin^[a]	9 – 16 Aug	10
World Rapid Championship	Doha	Swiss	25 – 31 Dec	TBD
World Blitz Championship	Doha	Multi-stage	25 – 31 Dec	TBD

Tournament	City	System	Dates	Players (2500+)
Monaco Grand Prix	Monaco	Round robin	17 – 28 Feb	10
Cyprus Grand Prix		Round robin	14 – 25 Mar	10
India Grand Prix		Round robin	14 – 25 Apr	10
Austria Grand Prix		Round robin	5 – 16 May	10
Norway Chess	Stavanger	Double round robin	26 May – 6 Jun	6 (6)
Grand Swiss	Samarkand	Swiss	3 – 15 Sep	114
World Cup	Batumi	Single elimination	5 – 29 Jul	103
World Rapid Championship	Doha	Swiss	25 – 31 Dec	TBD
World Blitz Championship	Doha	Multi-stage	25 – 31 Dec	TBD

^ ^a ^b ^c The rapid portion of the tournament is a single round robin, while the blitz portion is a double round robin.
^ Part of the 2025 Esports World Cup tournament series held in Riyadh. This tournament is part of the Champions Chess Tour 2025, which uses Chess.com and not a standard board.