6/20/2026 – At the end of the 1980s, Soenke Maus, who was born on 11 June 1967 in Bad Schwartau and celebrated his 59th birthday last week, was regarded as one of Germany's greatest talents. But in 1995 he ended his chess career and became a successful marine researcher in Norway. Maus played his most famous game in 1989 at an open tournament in Lugano: he won in just 19 moves, in a theoretically important variation, against Dr Robert Hübner. | Pictured: Soenke Maus, 1994 | Photo: Torsten Szobries

5/15/2026 – In 1983, 21 years after Wolfgang Uhlmann's victory over Mikhail Botvinnik at the 1962 Chess Olympiad in Varna, a German player once again managed to defeat a reigning world champion. In the first round of the International Mephisto Chess Tournament in Hanover, Wolfram Hartmann, then a 27-year-old law student from Bamberg, achieved one of the most astonishing underdog victories in German chess history against Anatoly Karpov (pictured). | Photo: V. Savostianov, Novosti Press (via Douglas Griffin)

5/9/2026 – Winning against the reigning world champion is always difficult. The first German player to achieve this feat after the Second World War was Wolfgang Unzicker, for many years the number one player in the Federal Republic of Germany. At the 1961 European Team Championship, he outplayed the then world champion Mikhail Botvinnik. Wolfgang Uhlmann, for many years the number one player in the GDR, was not to be outdone. In 1962, at the Chess Olympiad in Varna, he defeated Botvinnik - though not quite as convincingly as Unzicker had done a year earlier. | Image: Wolfgang Uhlmann in 1970 | Photo: Rob Mieremet, Anefo

4/7/2026 – Vincent Keymer has done it! With a quick draw against Maxime Vachier-Lagrave in the ninth and final round of the grenke Freestyle Chess Open in Karlsruhe, he secured overall victory and qualified for the 2027 Freestyle Chess World Championship. The draw left both Keymer and Vachier-Lagrave tied for first place with 7½ points each, but Keymer won thanks to his superior tiebreak score. Seven players finished half a point behind on 7/9. This group included Magnus Carlsen, who finished third on tiebreaks. | Photo: Nils Rohde / ChessBase

2/27/2026 – Round one of the Masters in Prague produced four wins and one draw. In round two things proceeded at a more leisurely pace with three draws and two wins. But the decisive games were interesting. David Anton (pictured) had an inferior position out of the opening against Jorden Van Foreest, but then won in 27 moves. And Hans Niemann had a winning position against Aravindh Chithambaram but overlooked a tactical possibility in time pressure and lost. | Photo: Petr Vrabec / Prague Chess Festival

2/26/2026 – Vincent Keymer had a rough start at the Prague Chess Festival, losing with black to Jorden van Foreest. After a botched opening, he missed a hidden counterblow that could have turned the game around. This game was only one of many interesting battles at the opening round in the Prague Masters, as all five games featured hard-fought struggles. Four games ended decisively, with only world champion Gukesh Dommaraju and Hans Niemann signing a draw. That draw, however, was the longest game of the round. | Photo: Petr Vrabec / Prague Chess Festival

2/17/2026 – Deep Blue was the first computer to win a match against the reigning World Champion. In May 1997, Deep Blue defeated Garry Kasparov in a six-game match by 3½–2½. Deep Blue was also the first computer ever to win a game under classical time control against a reigning World Champion - the first game of the first match between Deep Blue and Kasparov. In light of these successes, it is easy to forget that Kasparov won the first match 4–2 and at times made the supercomputer, which calculated an average of 126 million positions per second, look like little more than a competent beginner. Kasparov recognised the computer's potential at an early stage. | Photo: ChessBase

2/2/2026 – Christian Glöckler delivered an impressive performance at the Qualifiers in Wijk and had already secured overall victory with one round to spare. In the ninth and final round of the tournament, he added another win. He outplayed Tim Grutter with remarkable ease and finished on 8.5 points from 9 games, with an Elo performance of 2851. In 2027, he will be eligible to play in the Challengers. | Photo: Lennart Ootes

1/29/2026 – 14-year-old German IM Christian Gloeckler remains perfect in the Qualifiers Tournament in Wijk aan Zee: six rounds have been played, and he has won all six. This gives him a performance rating of 3228, and with three rounds to go he leads Henry Edward Tudor by 1.5 points; Tudor is in sole second place with 4.5 out of 6. | Photo: Lennart Ootes

1/27/2026 – In Wijk, the Masters and the Challengers take centre stage, but there are other tournaments as well. One of them is the Qualifiers, a round-robin event with ten mostly young and ambitious players, whose winner can hope for a place in the Challengers 2027. Fourteen-year-old IM Christian Gloeckler, regarded as one of Germany’s biggest talents, made a perfect start with 4 out of 4 – and played some tactically exciting games. | Photo: Nils Rohde

1/20/2026 – On 20 January 1999, Garry Kasparov played what may have been the greatest chess game of all time in Wijk. With a series of sacrifices he drove the black king onto the back rank, where he finally delivered checkmate. In a free reader, Robert Ris presents Kasparov’s masterpiece and other brilliancies from Wijk aan Zee.

1/19/2026 – At first glance, the Andranik Margaryan Memorial, held from 9 to 16 January in Armenia, did not appear particularly historic. Three GMs, six IMs and one FM took part, and with a rating of 2514 the Russian IM Vladislav Nozdrachev was the top seed. In the end, however, it was the 21-year-old Indian Aaryan Varshney who emerged victorious, becoming India’s 92nd grandmaster with this success. His story shows how modern computers, software and databases can help to win titles and celebrate success in chess — even without a trainer or support from federations. | Photo: Chess Academy of Armenia

1/12/2026 – On January 6, Magnus Carlsen and the 12-year-old Argentine Faustino Oro, who still has good chances of becoming the youngest grandmaster of all time, played Titled Tuesday at the Take Take Take Studio in Oslo. Afterwards, they chatted briefly and played a blitz game (3+2). Of course, “nothing” was at stake — but of course games between young talents, who may one day become world champions, and established or former world champions are always exciting and a battle for prestige. And this perhaps one day historically significant duel was captured on video.

1/7/2026 – The Rapid and Blitz World Championships had barely finished when Faustino Oro and Magnus Carlsen were already playing their next tournament. Both took part in the first Titled Tuesday of 2026 and commented on and streamed their games live from the Take Take Take Studio in Oslo. After the tournament, they stayed on in the studio, chatting about chess, football, the Norwegian weather, and what it is like to be so young and already so good at chess.

1/6/2026 – Vincent Keymer has enjoyed a very successful 2025. He went from one success to the next and, from January 2025 to January 2026, gained 43 rating points, starting 2026 as the world number four. At the World Blitz Chess Championship in Doha, which concluded on 30 December 2025, he finished only 38th with 12 points from 19 games. On the same day, however, he won the final Chess.com Titled Tuesday of 2025, rounding off his chess year with another success. | Photo: Vincent Keymer at the 2025 World Rapid and Blitz Championships | Photo: Lennart Ootes

12/8/2025 – Young players are often said to thrive on tactics while veterans rely on strategy. But the fifth game of the six-game match in Monte Carlo between 34-year-old Maxime Vachier-Lagrave and 14-year-old Yagiz Kaan Erdogmus told a different story. After four draws, the young Turkish talent claimed the first win of the match — a clean, textbook performance in the Spanish Exchange Variation.

12/4/2025 – The main attraction of the XTX Markets London Chess Classic is the elite tournament, but the FIDE Open was also very strong, featuring numerous titled players. After nine rounds, three players finished on 7 points and shared first place: GM Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu of India (pictured), GM Velimir Ilic of Serbia and GM Ameet K. Ghasi of England. As there were no tiebreaks in the event, the three also shared the prize money for the top three places. | Photo: Yury Krylov / London Chess Classic

12/1/2025 – The first half of the London Chess Classic was dominated by Nodirbek Abdusattorov (photo). In round 5 he defeated Nikolas Theodorou with White, reaching 4.5/5 at the halfway mark and pulling a full point ahead of Alireza Firouzja. Firouzja drew with Black against Gawain Maroroa Jones and now stands on 3.5/5. Abhimanyu Mishra and Luke McShane also drew, as did Pavel Eljanov and Michael Adams. The second win of the round went to Nikita Vitiugov, who won a theoretically interesting game against Sam Shankland.| Photo: Tennis legend Andy Murray (center) makes the ceremonial first move | Photo: Tournament page