12/16/2025 – Last week, Vlastimil Hort found his final resting place at Prague's Vyšehrad National Cemetery. It was "Vlasti's" wish to be buried in his hometown. His family, friends and companions gave him a final send-off – with a glass of champagne, for a special reason.

12/11/2025 – 11 December 2025 marks the 120th anniversary of Ludwig Engels's birthday. He was one of the best German chess players in the 1930s. Following the 1939 Chess Olympiad, he, like many others, remained in South America due to the outbreak of the Second World War and settled in Brazil. At the height of his career, Engels defeated renowned players such as Alekhine, Bogoljubow, Keres and Maroczy. | Photo source: Friedrich-Karl Hebeker

12/3/2025 – At the second Jerusalem Chess Festival, Arseniy Nesterov and Evgeny Alekseev qualified for the Masters as the best players in the Open and faced ten invited participants there. Svidler, Anand, Nepomniachtchi and Erigaisi advanced from the round-robin tournament of the Masters to the knockout stage. The semi-finals and finals will be played today. | Photos: Tournament website/ Alon Shulman

12/2/2025 – Alongside the elite tournament, the London Chess Classic also includes a well-attended open event. The world's highest-rated junior player, Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu, is the favourite and is also in the lead after seven rounds - though not alone. Tied with Pragg on 5½ are Velimir Ivic, Pranav Anand, David Gavrilescu, Daniel Fernandez and Ameet Ghasi. | Photos: London Chess Classic

12/2/2025 – 145 years ago, on 1 December 1880, Akiba Rubinstein was born, perhaps the strongest player of his time who never had the chance to play a World Championship match. For more than 20 years, Rubinstein was one of the leading players in the world, but his life took a tragic turn.

12/1/2025 – FIDE has just published its new World Ranking List. Vincent Keymer, Germany’s top player, has established himself in fourth place on the Elo list and firmly among the world’s elite. Magnus Carlsen, the world’s highest-rated player, also gained Elo. The best women come from China, and the best juniors from India.

11/30/2025 – At the next Candidates Tournament, in spring 2026 in Cyprus, eight players will compete to determine the challenger to world champion Gukesh Dommaraju. Five of the players are in the current world top ten, while three are far from it. Several top players who one might have expected to see in the Candidates failed to qualify by any route. Has FIDE put forth a fair World Championship format? | Photo: Larneg (Pixabay)

11/27/2025 – DeepMind Technologies has revolutionized AI research and, in its still relatively short history, produced many valuable results and breakthroughs. With its Go and chess programs AlphaGo and AlphaZero, DeepMind caused quite a stir in the gaming world, but of course the aim is about far more than winning games. A compelling film on this was shown at the Tribeca Festival and is now available on YouTube.

11/26/2025 – A major rapid chess festival will be held in Jerusalem starting on 26 November. A two-day open tournament with over 400 participants will be followed by a top tournament with a first-class line-up. Unfortunately, Boris Gelfand will be missing, as he was last year. The best Israeli player and the association's leadership have been in a long-running dispute, which has now become public. | Photo: ChessBase India

11/24/2025 – On 15 November, the Stavenhagenhaus, a splendid early 18th-century manor house in Hamburg, Germany, hosted a special event. The local community had invited Germany’s top female player and only woman GM, Elisabeth Pähtz, for a simul. Pähtz offered an engaging chess lesson and then won her simul against 20 opponents. | Photos: Uwe Schröder

11/19/2025 – Today would have been the 120th birthday of the American chess grandmaster, Isaac Kashdan. In the 1930s, he was widely regarded as one of the world's best players, almost on a par with Alekhine and Capablanca. He later made a name for himself as an author, referee and organiser. | Photo: Alexander Alekhine (left) and Isaac Kashdan playing blitz chess. José Araiza, Arthur Dake, Reuben Fine and Sammy Reshevsky in Pasadena in 1932.

11/18/2025 – A Russian team will be competing in an international team competition at the World Women's Team Championship in Linares for the first time since Russia's attack on Ukraine, albeit under the FIDE flag. While the FIDE Council has approved this, it contradicts the IOC's recommendation. Some critics also believe that FIDE's status as a recognised sports federation within the IOC is now under threat. Photos: Patricia Claros (FEDA), unless otherwise stated.

11/11/2025 – On 9 November 1985, Garry Kasparov defeated Anatoly Karpov in the 24th game of their World Championship match and became the 13th World Chess Champion. It was the conclusion of an extraordinary duel. The first match between the two, begun in 1984, had been abandoned after 48 games without a decisive result. In the rematch, the rules were changed: the match was limited to 24 games, and the reigning champion would retain the title in case of a tie. Across the two matches, Kasparov had to play a total of 72 games against Karpov to claim the crown — one of the most demanding World Championship battles in chess history. | Photos: Tass Archive

11/7/2025 – In his C-Squared podcast on YouTube, Fabiano Caruana recently discussed the results of recent chess events and then shared his observations and analysis of the ongoing FIDE World Cup. Finally, he was tempted to make a prediction about the possible winner. After some consideration, he chose...

11/6/2025 – Himank Ghosh conducted an interview with Vincent Keymer for ChessBase India after his victory over Vladislav Kovalev secured his place in the third round. Keymer said he was satisfied with his performance, but admitted, “There is pressure, especially the pressure I put on myself!”

11/4/2025 – Ljubomir Ljubojevic turned 75 on Sunday, 2 November. At the height of his career, he was one of the world's top players, ranking third behind Karpov and Kasparov in the 1980s. Thanks to his tactical attacking style, he was able to defeat almost any opponent. He retired from tournament chess in 2010. | Photo: Dagobert Kohlmeyer

11/2/2025 – It's now official: Vincent Keymer has jumped from ninth place last month to fourth place in the new FIDE world rankings. With his successes in the European Team Championship and the European Club Cup, the German star has improved his rating by another 18 points. Magnus Carlsen continue to be the highest-rated player in the world, while Hou Yifan still leads the women's rankings.

10/31/2025 – Many chess players have become successful politicians, and many politicians have enjoyed playing chess. The English politician Kenneth Baker held various positions in Margaret Thatcher's cabinet for some time. His love of chess helped him make the right decisions in the tango of politics.