Chess News

The American Cup: Live! March 23, 2023
America’s best chess players return to the Saint Louis Chess Club to battle over the board from March 17- 26 for the second annual American Cup. With $300,000 in prize money, the competitors will prove their mettle under mounting pressure in a double-elimination knockout tournament. Unlike in the inaugural edition, Hikaru Nakamura will be among […]
Robert Ris’ Fast and Furious: A fascinating battle in the Kalashnikov March 23, 2023
In his Fast & Furious show, Robert Ris analyses the fascinating Kalashnikov battle between Leinier Dominguez and Hikaru Nakamura. An absolute model game from Black’s perspective, as it shows that having the bishop pair doesn’t guarantee an automatic advantage! | Fast & Furious is available on-demand with a ChessBase Premium Account. You can register a […]
Leon Mendonca wins eight games in a row, secures first place at Hit Open March 23, 2023
Leon Luke Mendonca has won the 2023 Hit Open with a round to spare after scoring eight wins in as many games. In the penultimate round, the teenager defeated GM Nigel Davies in just 19 movies. The veteran grandmaster from England neglected the safety of his king and paid a heavy price for it. The […]
European Women’s Chess Championship - Live! March 23, 2023
The European Women’s Chess Championship is taking place on March 17-30 at the Hotel Palas in Petrovac, Montenegro. The event features 136 players from 34 federations. The top 9 players in the final standings will get a spot in the next edition of the FIDE Women’s World Cup. | Follow the games live with computer […]
Anna and Mariya Muzychuk will not play in the second leg of the Grand Prix March 23, 2023
On March 24, the third of four tournaments in the FIDE Women’s Grand Prix Series 2022/2023 will begin in New Delhi, India. Twelve players will compete, but the two Ukrainian grandmasters Anna and Mariya Muzychuk have decided not to take part, presumably because Kateryna Lagno, Polina Shuvalova and Aleksandra Goryachkina, who are members of the […]
American Cup: Nakamura and Krush win champions’ brackets March 23, 2023
Hikaru Nakamura and Irina Krush emerged victorious in the champions’ brackets of the open and women’s sections of the American Cup. Both multiple US champions won their matches in tiebreaks. Nakamura got the better of Wesley So by a 4-2 score, while Krush defeated Alice Lee more quickly, by a 3-1 score. In the elimination […]
Meet The Fritztrainer - Ján Markoš March 22, 2023
We have some good news for you. The Slovakian GM Jan Markos has created his first Fritztrainers for ChessBase, and their release is just around the corner. It is time to meet your new Fritztrainer in our interview. Jan understands to break complex themes down to several rule of thumbs which are very practical for […]
CBM 211: Battle of giants in the Bundesliga March 22, 2023
ChessBase Magazine offers a window to the world of professional chess. 618 games (20 annotated) from the Schachbundesliga, Meltwater Tour Tournament and the U.S. Championship, plus 12 opening surveys, 8 demo lectures and several exercises for training. Annotators include Loek Van Wely, Pavel Eljanov and Luke McShane, Erwin L’Ami, Nikita Vitiugov, Nils Grandelius and Gawain […]
American Cup: Aronian knocks out Caruana in Armageddon March 22, 2023
In the most thrilling match of the tournament so far, Levon Aronian knocked out Fabiano Caruana to remain alive in the elimination bracket, where he is set to face Leinier Dominguez next. In the women’s elimination bracket, Nazi Paikidze and Gulrukhbegim Tokhirjonova were the winners of the day and will face off on Wednesday. Meanwhile, […]
A fresh idea against the Scotch March 21, 2023
In the current ChessBase Magazine #212 you will find new repertoire ideas for eleven different openings - from the English Opening to the King's Indian. In his search for a suitable weapon against the Scotch, Lars Schandorff has come across a fresh idea with which Black immediately seeks active play: After 1.e4 e5 2.Nf3 Nc6 […]
World Solving Cup: Titles for Piorun and Sidiropoulos March 21, 2023
The series of open national competitions for the World Solving Cup 2022/23 continued this month, with events in Poland and the Netherlands. Kacper Piorun won the Polish competition, while Nikos Sidiropoulos (Greece) was the winner in the Dutch event. In Poland, eight minutes decided the winner; in the Netherlands, one subtle endgame study made the […]
Joseph Henry "The Black Death" Blackburne: The Grand Old Man of British Chess March 21, 2023
In Eugene Manlapao's previous articles, he has featured the leading players of 19th century British chess. Among them were Amos Burn, Isidor Gunsberg, and the London residents Johannes Zukertort of Poland and Wilhelm Steinitz of Austria. Another one of their great contemporaries was Joseph Henry Blackburne, Britain's strongest player for nearly three decades. "The Black […]
Attacking in the endgame March 21, 2023
Rooks are powerful and two rooks are even more powerful, and given the chance, they can quickly mate the enemy king. In the diagram position the white rooks are passive and seem to be doomed to defend the b-pawn. But it is White to move and win. How?
American Cup: Nakamura beats Dominguez, So takes down Caruana March 21, 2023
Hikaru Nakamura and Wesley So advanced to the final match of the champions bracket in the open section of the American Cup after beating Leinier Dominguez and Fabiano Caruana respectively. Among the women, Irina Krush and Alice Lee scored 1½-½ wins to set up a rematch from last year’s edition in the final. The losers […]
Endgame Magic #232 with Ilamparthi A R: Endgame highlights from the WR Chess Masters in Düsseldorf March 20, 2023
Ilamparthi A R (born in 2009) is one of the most promising talents from India, a country with a lot of promising talents. He is the U14 World Champion, India's youngest International Master and has just won the U14 tournament at the WR Masters in Düsseldorf. When Ilamparthi visited the ChessBase headquarters in Hamburg, he […]
Women's Candidates Final: Lei Tingjie and Tan Zhongyi face off in Chongqing, China March 20, 2023
The 2023 FIDE Women's Candidates Final will be disputed in Chongqing (China) from March 27th to April 6th. Chinese Grandmasters Lei Tingjie and Tan Zhongyi will face each other in a six-game classical chess match. The winner will receive 60,000 Euros and the right to challenge the current Women's World Champion, Ju Wenjun, for the […]
Congratulations! Rainer Knaak celebrates his 70th birthday March 20, 2023
Rainer Knaak was born on 16 March 1953 in Pasewalk, Mecklenburg-Vorpommern. In 1974, at the age of 21, Knaak became the then youngest grandmaster in the world. The mathematician is a 5-time champion of the German Democratic Republic, and always caused a stir with his optimistic and elegant attacking style. Knaak was also successful as […]
American Cup: Shankland knocks out Robson in dramatic match March 20, 2023
Day 3 of the American Cup saw four players eliminated from the tournament, as the first matches of the Elimination Bracket took place. Levon Aronian knocked out Sam Sevian, while Sam Shankland won a hotly contested playoff against Ray Robson. Meanwhile, in the women’s section, Tatev Abrahamyan took down Katerina Nemcova, while newcomer WGM Atousa […]
Rocking the boat March 19, 2023
When choosing a move during a game of chess, there will be a compromise between instinct and calculation. In reasonably clear positions, you may be able to rely on the former with just a few checks for blunders, but there are situations which require you to go deeper into the position. At times, if nothing […]
Understanding before Moving 117: Play the Sicilian (18) March 19, 2023
Herman Grooten is an International Master, a renowned trainer and the author of several highly acclaimed books about chess training and chess strategy. In the 117th instalment of his ChessBase show "Understanding before Moving", Herman shows a game of Dutch author Willy Hendriks and continues to explain why it is good to study and to […]

lichess.org blog

Aronian Takes WR Masters February 27, 2023
PHOTO: Lennart Ootes / WR Chess Masters When Levon Aronian made a quick draw against co-leader Dommaraju Gukesh in the final round of the WR Chess Masters, it seemed like an uncharacteristically timid move for the Armenian grandmaster, who’s long been known as one of the most creative and aggressive players on the tour. But […]
@CheckRaiseMate
5 Centimeters of Hair: Iranian Chess in 2023 January 11, 2023
Shohreh Bayat had not been planning to take a stand, but sometimes it happens anyway. She was working as the Chief Arbiter for the 2020 Women’s World Championship held in China when the President of the Chess Federation from her native Iran sent a message that got under her skin. “The president of the chess […]
@NoJoke
Titled Arena Announcement(s) January 2, 2023
Announcing our schedule for upcoming Titled Arenas!We're pleased to announce the schedule for our upcoming Titled Arenas! All events will be preceded by a warm-up arena open to all players with a minimum of 20 rated games in the relevant time control (excluding 960 warm-up, where the minimum rated games are 10). Prizes unless otherwise […]
Lichess Team
Lichess End of Year Update 2022 January 1, 2023
Happy New Year!Like that, 2022 is over! Is it just us, or does it feel like it has flown by? 2022 has been an unprecedentedly eventful year for chess, and it’s been no exception for us at Lichess. Thank you to everyone who makes it possible – to all those who volunteer, to all those […]
Lichess Team
The November Titled Arena 960 does a 360 with Bortnyk first, Carlsen seventh December 4, 2022
Fischer Random lives up to its name. Well, at least the random part.For the first few millennia, life on this planet made a certain degree of sense. Creatures would eat, reproduce and subsequently die followed by their offspring doing roughly the same. Then, not much more than a hundred years ago, we humans devised a […]
@ZugAddict
Women Candidates Pool B Kicks Off in Khiva, Uzbekistan November 29, 2022
PHOTO: FIDE/Timur Sattarov Four players, two games, two draws, the first day of Women’s Candidate’s Pool B was concluded. The event is taking place from 29 November to 11 December, and the winner qualifies to the Candidates finals, facing Pool A winner, Lei Tingjie, for the right to participate in the Women’s World Championship Match […]
@Konstantinos07
Settlement Reached in Stockfish v ChessBase November 21, 2022
In July of 2021 we reported that legal proceedings had begun between the developers of Stockfish, the world’s strongest chess engine, and Chessbase GmbH, developers of various popular chess software. After more than a year of wrangling, that lawsuit has now come to an end with the parties agreeing to a settlement. Per the agreement, […]
@NoJoke
KontraJako narrowly wins TA Arena ahead of mutdpro, MatthewG-p4p November 8, 2022
And why Sergei Zhigalko's epic near-comeback might have been the story of the tournamentThe anonymous Grandmaster "Kontrajako" edged out mutdpro (GM Minh Le Tuan) in last Saturday's Titled Arena with MatthewG-p4p (IM Matvey Galchenko) coming in third (an auspicious result for the young Russian International Master). The top two places were decided in the final […]
@zugaddict
Lichess Recruits Full-Time Mobile Developer November 5, 2022
In some our recent updates, we shared Lichess' future plans. With an eye on our future, we have exciting news!Because of our community's generosity, we’re pleased to announce that we’ve hired a full-time mobile developer to work on the Lichess mobile applications available on iOS and Android, starting from 1 November 2022. The number of […]
@lichess @cynosure
Taking Lichess to the Next Level October 28, 2022
Our current setup and our future plansLast month, we published a blog about Lichess’s charity nonprofit status. In this post, we want to dive deeper into Lichess’s history, how we’re currently set up, and our plans for the future.Between 2010 and 2016, virtually all of Lichess’s costs were covered by Lichess’s founder and main developer […]
@cynosure @izzie26
Bortnyk victorious after NM ZugAddict somehow fails to win October TA October 16, 2022
Dozens of followers distraughtIn a month full of surprises and controversy in the world of chess, yet another bombshell failed to occur when National Master John Chernoff (ZugAddict on https://lichess.org) was at no point a significant factor in yesterday's Titled Arena, finishing 141st out of 366 participants. When asked by absolutely no one to explain […]
@ZugAddict
Lichess Qualifiers Send Nakamura and Abdusattorov to World Fischer Random Championship October 7, 2022
306,296 games. 20,171,017 moves. 73,000+ entries to the Lichess qualifiers. Two winners — GM Hikaru Nakamura and GM Nodirbek Abdusattorov.Both Hikaru Nakamura and Nodirbek Abdusattorov were players awarded wildcards from co-organisers; Nakamura’s from the Charlotte Chess Center and North American Corporate Chess League and Abdusattorov’s wildcard was from Offerspill Sjakklubb. Try our custom puzzle set […]
@Cynosure, @Konstantinos07
Charity? Non-profit? No profit? September 29, 2022
A treatise on "business models"We’ve spoken before about Lichess’s ethical stance and how we do “business”. Indeed, at the bottom of this and every other of our blog posts there is a short explanation: Lichess is a charity and entirely free/libre open source software.All operating costs, development, and content are funded solely by user donations. […]
@lichess
Midway Through The World Fischer Random Championship Qualifiers on Lichess September 9, 2022
With the open and invitational arena stage over, we now move to the first Swiss stages marking the midpoint of the qualifiers on Lichess.At the Swiss stages, eligible players can only take part in the groups they’ve been sorted into. Eligible players and the groups they’ve been sorted into can be found here.All the Swiss […]
@Lichess, @Cynosure
Titled Arena Announcement(s) August 29, 2022
Announcing our schedule for upcoming Titled Arenas!We're pleased to announce a schedule for our upcoming Titled Arenas! All events will be preceded by a warm-up arena open to all players with a minimum of 20 rated games in the relevant time control (excluding 960 warm-up, where the minimum rated games are 10). Prizes unless otherwise […]
Lichess Team
Daniel Naroditsky With a Back-to-Back Titled Arena win! August 28, 2022
Naroditsky with pure domination comes in first, with Minh Le in second and kontraJako in third place behind him.GM Daniel Naroditsky secured himself the first place in this Saturday's Titled Arena with an absolute dominating lead of 26 points to the second place, taken by IM Minh Le. The third place was taken by GM […]
@loepare
FIDE World Fischer Random Championship – Update August 26, 2022
The halfway mark of the open qualification process for the FIDE World Fischer Random Championships - have you qualified yet?The Lichess paths to qualify into the FIDE World Fischer Random Championship – to be held in Reykjavik from 25 - 30 October later this year – are well underway.-> See if you qualified already.-> Find […]
@cynosure @izzie26
Play in a Chess World Championship August 18, 2022
Take part in a World Championship qualifier held on Lichess for free, and take your shot at eternal glory – and part of a $400,000 prize fundLichess announces global entry paths to the FIDE World Fischer Random Finals, with anyone eligible for entry, entirely for free The 2022 edition of the FIDE World Fischer Random […]
@cynosure @izzie26
Lichess Half-Year Update & New Feature Sneak Preview August 2, 2022
August is the perfect time for a June update :)As we move into August the Lichess team started to curate the improvements, new features, and work your donations and support has allowed us to do. In only the six months from January to June, we have already accomplished so much this year! Read on to […]
Lichess @Cynosure
A first time Grandmaster Titled Arena winner and Nakamura's forbidden platform July 25, 2022
Sometimes arenas can be cruel. The second place score in Saturday’s Bullet Titled Arena would have been enough to win June’s bullet arena by 19 points. Instead, it was enough to lose to IM Minh Le by 24 points. Minh was absolutely dominant, starting out by winning an incredible 22 games in a row. From […]
@NoJoke