The current FIDE ratings list 1,643,067 players. Of these 502,209 are in the "standard" rating list, the total of 1.6 million include rapid and blitz ratings.
As of May 2025, the number of FIDE-rated chess players by country is as follows (rounded to the nearest hundred):
These five countries have the largest number of FIDE-rated players by a significant margin.
China, despite being one of the chess superpowers in terms of elite player strength, has a much smaller base of rated players compared to the above countries. Despite its population (1.4 billion) China has only about 658 active FIDE rated players, ranking it 46th globally. But it is considered a chess superpower, due to the exceptional strength of its elite players. For example, China is third globally in the average rating of its top ten players, ahead of countries with much larger pools of rated players, such as Germany and Ukraine.
The other rising chess superpower, India, has a vastly greater base of rated tournament players – and a higher average rating of the top ten players. Which brings us to a little quiz question:
Why does India, which has almost exactly the same population base as China, have over 32,000 active players, while China only has just 658? There is a very simple reason for this. Think about it – the answer is given at the end of this article.
In 1993 we counted 524 grandmasters world-wide. This year FIDE has reported that the number has climbed to between 1,730 and 1,800. Of these, around 700 to 1000 are active – which means they take part in tournaments and have maintained a rating above the GM threshold.
If you have a ChessBase account, you can check the details of all the FIDE rated players by clicking "Players" on the right of the news page, or by going directly to
https://players.chessbase.com.
There you can search for any player in the list FIDE list and learn all the salient details on this player: his or her age, Elo progress over the years, performance with white and black, favourite openings, weaknesses, etc. You even get a series of pictures and a list of key games to replay.
The following table shows you the ten countries with the highest numbers of grandmasters. Here are the numbers of GMs in the top countries, and how they increased in 32 years. The final column shows you the average ratings of the top ten GMs:
| Country | 1993 | 2025 | Avg. Top 10 |
| Russia | 91 | >210 | 2657 |
| United States | 40 | 106 | 2728 |
| Germany | 34 | 96 | 2633 |
| Ukraine | 29 | 89 | 2630 |
| India | 2 | 75 | 2727 |
| Spain | 8 | 57 | 2618 |
| France | 6 | 54 | 2626 |
| Jug. Serbia | (33) | 52 | 2570 |
| Hungary | 30 | 51 | 2626 |
| Poland | 8 | 50 | 2595 |
Russia was and remains the country with the largest number of grandmasters worldwide. The number of GMs in the US grew considerably, when grandmasters from other countries (e.g. Fabiano Caruana, Wesley So, Levon Aronian) joined the federation.
The most dramatic growth has taken place in India, which progressed from two (Anand and Barua) to 86, with twelve in the top 120 in the world, and three in the top ten – including reigning world champion Gukesh.
Germany has 30 to 40 GMs, with four (Vincent Keymer, Frederik Svane, Matthias Bluebaum, Rasmus Svane) listed in the top 100 in the world.
Let us compare the ratings of the top thirty player from 32 years ago with the ratings today.
| 2025 | 1993 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Carlsen, Magnus | NOR | 2837 | Kasparov, Gary | RUS | 2805 | |
| 2 | Nakamura, Hikaru | USA | 2804 | Fischer, Robert J | USA | 2780 | |
| 3 | Gukesh D | IND | 2787 | Karpov, Anatoly | RUS | 2725 | |
| 4 | Erigaisi Arjun | IND | 2782 | Anand, Viswanathan | IND | 2710 | |
| 5 | Caruana, Fabiano | USA | 2776 | Ivanchuk, Vassily | UKR | 2710 | |
| 6 | Abdusattorov, Nodirbek | UZB | 2771 | Gelfand, Boris | BLR | 2690 | |
| 7 | Praggnanandhaa R | IND | 2758 | Kramnik, Vladimir | RUS | 2685 | |
| 8 | Wei, Yi | CHN | 2758 | Shirov, Alexei | ESP | 2670 | |
| 9 | Firouzja, Alireza | FRA | 2757 | Bareev, Evgeny | RUS | 2670 | |
| 10 | Nepomniachtchi, Ian | RUS | 2757 | Georgiev, Kiril | BUL | 2660 | |
| 11 | So, Wesley | USA | 2751 | Salov, Valery | RUS | 2660 | |
| 12 | Aravindh, Chithambaram VR. | IND | 2749 | Azmaiparashvili, Zurab | GEO | 2655 | |
| 13 | Aronian, Levon | USA | 2747 | Short, Nigel D | ENG | 2655 | |
| 14 | Mamedyarov, Shakhriyar | AZE | 2746 | Kamsky, Gata | USA | 2655 | |
| 15 | Anand, Viswanathan | IND | 2743 | Lautier, Joel | FRA | 2645 | |
| 16 | Duda, Jan-Krzysztof | POL | 2739 | Jussupow, Artur | GER | 2645 | |
| 17 | Fedoseev, Vladimir | SLO | 2739 | Sokolov, Ivan | BIH | 2640 | |
| 18 | Giri, Anish | NED | 2738 | Topalov, Veselin | BUL | 2635 | |
| 19 | Dominguez Perez, Leinier | USA | 2738 | Timman, Jan H | NED | 2635 | |
| 20 | Niemann, Hans Moke | USA | 2736 | Polugaevsky, Lev | RUS | 2635 | |
| 21 | Ding, Liren | CHN | 2734 | Adams, Michael | ENG | 2630 | |
| 22 | Le, Quang Liem | VIE | 2729 | Agdestein, Simen | NOR | 2630 | |
| 23 | Vachier-Lagrave, Maxime | FRA | 2723 | Khalifman, Alexander | RUS | 2630 | |
| 24 | Rapport, Richard | HUN | 2722 | Nikolic, Predrag | BIH | 2630 | |
| 25 | Keymer, Vincent | GER | 2720 | Hjartarson, Johann | ISL | 2625 | |
| 26 | Vidit, Santosh Gujrathi | IND | 2720 | Andersson, Ulf | SWE | 2625 | |
| 27 | Topalov, Veselin | BUL | 2717 | Gulko, Boris F | USA | 2625 | |
| 28 | Yu, Yangyi | CHN | 2714 | Ehlvest, Jaan | EST | 2625 | |
| 29 | Harikrishna, Pentala | IND | 2707 | Dautov, Rustem | GER | 2625 | |
| 30 | Maghsoodloo, Parham | IRI | 2706 | Kaidanov, Gregory S | USA | 2620 |
We see that the average of the top 30 today is 2747. In 1993 it was 2661.
The average rating of the top 100 chess players in the world in May 2025 was Elo 2667. The entire FIDE top 100 list is without a single female player, with Hou Yifan, 2633, occupying place 102. But good news: the Live Chess Ratings of May 30 she has climbed to place 100. She did this without playing any games and gaining any rating points. It was the result of higher-ranked players descending to a spot below her.
Here's the average ratings of the genders:
| Top 10 men = 2779 | vs | Top 10 women = 2548 |
| Top 20 men = 2761 | vs | Top 20 women = 2514 |
| Top 50 men = 2723 | vs | Top 50 women = 2455 |
| Top 100 men = 2687 | vs | Top 100 women = 2411 |
There is a lot more statistical data mining to be done, and you can expect more articles to follow. If you wish to contribute, please use this feedback link.
The reason why China has so few active chess players can be expressed in one word: Xiangqi (象棋, pronounced "shiang-chee"). There is a rival game! It is the most popular board game in China. It has been estimated that there are 1.2 billion people throughout the country who have at least occasionally played the game. If you see people playing in parks or the street side, it will be Xiangqi, in India it will be classical chess. Young people who become interested in strategic board games in India will learn and play chess, in China Xiangqi.
A similar question would be: why are there so much fewer baseball players in India than in the US? There is a similar one-word answer: cricket!
