2/19/2023 – Levon Aronian continues to lead the standings at the WR Chess Masters, as all five games ended drawn in Sunday’s fourth round. A few of the encounters featured double-edged openings, but accurate defensive responses prevented any of them from finishing decisively. Monday is a rest day in Düsseldorf. | Photo: Lennart Ootes

2/19/2023 – 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 113th instalment of his ChessBase show "Understanding before Moving", Herman continues to explain why it is good to study and to play the Sicilian. | Photo: Pascal Simon

2/19/2023 – It was in May 2016 that I launched this column, initially as an Agony Column in which readers could showcase their triumphs and disasters, and today I’m returning to the roots with a couple of my own games. Of course, I care very much when I’m playing, but ‘agony’ and ‘ecstasy’ are too strong for the emotions that chess normally engenders in me nowadays, and I’ve gone for ‘fairly gentle pleasure’ at victory and ‘mild to medium irritation’ at defeat. | Photo: David Llada

2/18/2023 – Levon Aronian is now the sole leader at the WR Chess Masters in Düsseldorf. The Armenian ace, representing the United States since 2021, defeated Nodirbek Abdusattorov from the white side of a Sicilian Dragon in a rather lopsided game. Meanwhile, in the one game of the day featuring two youngsters, Praggnanandhaa defeated Vincent Keymer, also with white. | Photo: Lennart Ootes

2/18/2023 – Last Monday, Alexandra Kosteniuk (pictured) won the second stage of the FIDE Women’s Grand Prix, a 12-player single round-robin that took place in Munich, Germany. GM Karsten Müller followed the games closely, and sent us a selection of thought-provoking endgames. Find here six instructive positions, annotated by our in-house expert. | Photo: Mark Livshitz / FIDE

2/18/2023 – In the diagram position, White has to act quickly in the face of Black's threat e5-e4 - and in the end it will be he who triumphs on the diagonal c2-h7. Happy uncovering!

2/15/2023 – The Kasparov Chess Foundation organized the third annual KCF University Cup. This event was played on lichess.org and hosted on chessstream.com on the weekend of February 4 and 5, 2023. The tournament attracted well over 500 university students from every continent and from nearly thirty countries. The event was a resounding success.

2/15/2023 – Grandmasters Anish Giri and Sandipan Chanda gave master classes on the same day (21 Oct 2022) in ProChess, and I got to witness the interesting chess lessons being discussed in those sessions. Any chess fan would be thrilled with it, and my experience was absolutely fascinating! In this article, I share a few interesting positions and thought processes I encountered from these sessions. | Photo: Shahid Ahmed

2/14/2023 – Wednesday evening will see the official opening of the WR Masters at the Hyatt Regency Hotel in Düsseldorf. The tournament starts on Thursday at 14:00 with the 1st round. A number of players from the next generation will face the current world elite. For Ian Nepomiachtchi, the tournament is also a dress rehearsal for the World Championship in April. German chess fans are keeping their fingers crossed for Vincent Keymer in particular.

2/14/2023 – The chess world mourns the death of Jorge Vega. The long-time President of the American Continental Chess Federation was a comrade-in-arms of Che Guevara in the Cuban Revolution, though he was later imprisoned in Cuba because of his international contacts. Vega then lived in Mexico and was president of the Confederacion de Adjedres para America (CCA) from 20202. | Photo: Anastasia Karlovich

2/14/2023 – Today: Mathias Feist implemented the feature to analyse after a played game! This wasn't possible before ChessBase 17. ChessBase 17 offers many new features. We help to use them optimally! In our new video series, our developers personally explain the new features they have developed themselves. From the new data format to the beauty index. In no time at all, you'll learn how it's done.

2/14/2023 – In November 2022, the OpenAI company released ChatbotGPT and since then, this programme has been making headlines. It can write poems and stories, reports, articles, computer code and much more. It will, experts seem to agree, change the world. Apparently, the chatbot has now tried its hand at chess. On YouTube, the well-known streamer Levy "Gotham Chess" Rozman presents a game that ChatGPT allegedly played against the programme Stockfish. A game in which ChatGTP repeatedly amazes with surprising moves and never-before-seen manoeuvres.