4/21/2024 – Gukesh D, at 17, is a win away from becoming the next World Chess Championship challenger. The Indian prodigy beat Alireza Firouzja on Saturday to go into the final round of the Candidates Tournament as the sole leader. Three experienced contenders, who are also the top seeds in Toronto, stand a half point behind: Ian Nepomniachtchi, Hikaru Nakamura and Fabiano Caruana. Caruana joined the chasing pack by beating Praggnanandhaa R with the black pieces. | Photo: FIDE / Michal Walusza

4/16/2024 – Herman Grooten is an International Master, a renowned trainer and the author of several highly acclaimed books on chess training and strategy. In the 173rd episode of his ChessBase show "Understanding before moving" Herman continues his series "Chess history in a nutshell" and continues to take a look at the chess legacy of Boris Spassky, World Champion from 1969 to 1972. | Photo: Pascal Simon

3/25/2024 – We owe the vast majority of chess knowledge available to us today to the masters of the past, no matter whether it's about opening theory, strategic concepts or techniques in the endgame. Former German national coach Dorian Rogozenco honours the achievements by these masters in his "Modern Classics" series in ChessBase Magazine. In each issue he familiarises you with a selected brilliancy. This week we offer you Nezhmetdinov-Chernikov (1962) from the current CBM #218 as a free sample - you can even watch and enjoy the video analysis on your smartphone in ChessBase book format. Have fun!

3/9/2024 – It is certainly one of the most famous games in chess history: the 13-year-old future FIDE World Champion Bobby Fischer played a spectacular combination against IM Donald Byrne, one that has been shown and analysed by generations of chess players and writers. Today on what would have been Bobby's 81 birthday, GM Efstratios Grivas gives us a comprehensive summary of all available analysis, including those of Garry Kasparov and GM Karsten Mueller of ChessBase. Many other sources were taken into account to make sure that no blind spots are remaining!

2/2/2024 – The history of the Candidates Tournaments and Candidates Matches dates back to 1950. In its anniversary year, FIDE is looking forward to the Candidates Tournaments in Toronto in April 2024 and provides an overview of the history of these competitions. | Photos: Via FIDE

1/30/2024 – Boris Spassky, world champion from 1969 to 1972, celebrates his 87th birthday on 30 January. Spassky is regarded as a universal player and played numerous fantastic attacking games during his career. One of his favourite openings with White was the King's Gambit, which he used to beat players such as David Bronstein, Bobby Fischer, Yasser Seirawan and Anatoly Karpov. | Photo: Boris Spassky, Chess Olympiad Saloniki 1984 | Photo: Gerhard Hund

12/24/2023 – From a very young age, Rita Atkins has been active in the chess community, achieving notable success in various chess tournaments, reaching the title of Women's International Master (WIM) and winning the Hungarian Women's Chess Championship in 1992. She has also been involved in teaching chess and mathematics to school children and youth. In a lengthy interview with Uvencio Blanco, she remarked: "Give it another hundred years, and there will be just as many good female players as male ones".

12/13/2023 – The Sicilian Najdorf is one of the most aggressive answers to 1.e4, and its theory develops dynamically - the young German grandmaster Luis Engel brings all aficionados up to date with his two-volume Fritztrainer course. Christian Höthe had a look at the course and is enthusiastic.

11/30/2023 – Hans Niemann won the Tournament of Peace in spectacular fashion. The US grandmaster secured tournament victory with a round to spare, but nonetheless checkmated rating favourite Anton Korobov in the final round. Korobov, Ante Brkic and Vasyl Ivanchuk finished in shared second place, a whole 3 points behind the winner. | Photo: Official website

11/7/2023 – How do you train, what do you train, why do you train and how useful is it to train or play chess at all? These and a whole series of other questions were answered by the Slovakian grandmaster, successful author and renowned coach Jan Markos in a ChessBase interview with Johannes Fischer.

10/26/2023 – The "hedgehog" structure is a very resistant structure that also offers many possibilities for active play. It is not the specific variations that are important, but the knowledge of the typical ideas and plans. Dutch coach Herman Grooten teaches this in his Fritztrainer course "Key concepts of Chess - The Hedgehog". Philipp Hillebrand had a look at the course.

10/12/2023 – In 1971 Bobby Fischer was on his way to the World Championship, but agreed to take part in a blitz tournament in New York, organised by the Manhattan Chess Club. Fischer won the tournament 25.5 - 0.5. But in round 1, Fischer came close to losing against the well-known and popular author GM Andrew Soltis, but managed to turn the tables. On Twitter/X Davide Nastasio shared a picture of this encounter - and here is the story behind the picture.

9/22/2023 – With eleven opening articles, ChessBase Magazine #215 covers the usual broad spectrum and provides new repertoire ideas for every tournament player. For example, a concept against the Alekhine Defence: Sergey Grigoriants presents the "sharpest and most principled approach against the Alekhine Defence" with 5.f4! and is convinced that he has "proved White's advantage in all variations". Alekhine expert Christian Bauer attests our author an "excellent job. I now know why the variation 1.e4 Nf6 2.e5 Nd5 3.d4 d6 4.c4 Nb6 5.f4 dxe5 6.fxe5 Bf5 7.Nc3 e6 is bad for Black!". Take a look! You can find the complete article with all games and analyses in the current CBM #215.

9/19/2023 – An opening trap is particularly effective if it is built up with natural-looking development moves and is thus hardly recognisable for an uninformed opponent. Trap expert Rainer Knaak presents a collection of promising traps from tournament practice in every issue of ChessBase Magazine. In the current issue #215 there are eight examples - from Trompowsky via Sicilian and Ruy Lopez to King's Indian. Rainer Knaak also demonstrates three of his favourite traps in video in CBM #215; you can watch one of the videos here!

9/18/2023 – Thirty years ago, the World Championship match between Garry Kasaprov and Nigel Short was played in London. The match was not organized by FIDE and divided the chess world in two. The match was very one-sided. Dagobert Kohlmeyer was there. | Photos: Dagobert Kohlmeyer

9/15/2023 – ChessBase Magazine #215 offers over an hour of video playing time with its three opening videos alone (the total playing time of all videos in CBM #215 is more than seven hours). Robert Ris uses three new games by Richard Rapport to examine what White can hope for in the Vienna Game after 5.Qf3. Ivan Sokolov examines the highly topical variation 11.h4!? in the Semi-Tarrasch, especially Giri's novelty 13.Rh3 against Praggnanandhaa. And Daniel King gives a recommendation for the side line 3...e5 against the Sicilian Rossolimo Variation which has already been tested at the highest level. You can watch an extract from Robert Ris' analysis here!

9/13/2023 – Thanks to his tournament wins in the American Cup and Norway Chess this year, Hikaru Nakamura moved up to second place in the FIDE world rankings (August 2023). In the "Special" of ChessBase Magazine #215 our authors analyse their favourite games of the top grandmaster - an exclusive collection of 19 great encounters from the period 2007 to 2023 awaits you! In addition, Mihail Marin sheds light on "Nakamura's strategy in practice" with videos + many training exercises. And Karsten Mueller presents a selection of the most beautiful endgames from "H-Bomb". As a sample from the "Special" you can watch Michal Krasenkow's analysis of his game against Nakamura from 2007 here. Have fun!

9/10/2023 – Are chess players ice-cold creatures who always make their decisions at the board out of pure calculation? Of course not, even Magnus Carlsen is not emotionless, says GM Jan Markos in his contribution to the current ChessBase Magazine #215. In fact, very different emotions can influence decision-making in chess - often to one's own disadvantage. Markos presents three examples of this from his own practice and explores the question of how the influence of emotions can be counteracted. You can watch an excerpt from his video contribution here.

9/6/2023 – The new ChessBase Magazine #215 offers, among other things, 36 extensively annotated games. More than half of them build the "Special" of this issue: an exclusive collection of outstanding games by Hikaru Nakamura! In addition, Anish Giri, Grigoriy Oparin, Ivan Cheparinov, Thai Dai Van Nguyen et al. provide analyses from Norway Chess 2023 and Sharjah Masters 2023. Arjun Erigaisi played a brilliancy against Vladislav Kovalev in Sharjah - you can find an abridged version of his analysis here!

9/3/2023 – 2...d6 is Black's favourite Sicilian. In the new CBM #215 Christian Braun presents a concept for White with 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.e5!? that is attractive in various respects: White immediately forces the pace, leads the game into terrain that is often unknown to the opponent and gets "dynamic and powerful play" with little risk of his own. You don't need to learn too many variations by heart in this straightforward system either. Take a look at the article in CBM #215 and then do a first practical test on the chess server right away!

8/31/2023 – World-class chess explained in video: Dorian Rogozenco shows two wins of Hikaru Nakamura from Norway Chess 2023, including the decisive last-round game against Fabiano Caruana – Sharjah Masters 2023: Analyses by tournament winner Arjun Erigaisi as well as Ivan Cheparinov, Grigoriy Oparin, Thai Dai Van Ngyuen and Samvel Ter-Sahakyan – “Special” on Hikaru Nakamura: exclusive collection of 19 encounters with detailed commentary from 2007 to 2023 – Action in the centre: Christian Braun's Anti-Sicilian recipe 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 d6 3.Nc3 Nf6 4.e5!? - "Nakamura's strategy in practice": Mihail Marin sheds light on the US American's skills, incl. two interactive videos and a large collection of exercises – Rossolimo á la Carlsen: Daniel King recommends the cutting-edge 1.e4 c5 2.Nf3 Nc6 3.Bb5 e5!? for Black. - "Basic Knowledge" Part #5: Karsten Mueller reveals tips and tricks in the endgame with two pawns against one. incl. two interactive training videos and much more!

8/3/2023 – Howard Staunton (April 1819 – June 22, 1874) stands as a controversial figure in chess. Not only did he establish himself as the strongest player in the 1840s, but also elevated the comprehension of the game as the most prominent analyst and author of his generation. His influence as a player and organizer contributed to the standardization of the chess pieces and to the development of international competition. Yet, he was also a complex character who made foes out of his competitors and friends alike. | Picture source: World Chess Hall of Fame.

7/27/2023 – There is a new celebrity chess couple: Atousa Pourkashiyan and Hikaru Nakamura announced their wedding and now join the list of prominent chess couples. Given their playing level, they are surely near the top of the unofficial couples’ rating list. | Photo: Atousa Pourkashiyan’s Instagram profile

7/15/2023 – Spassky is considered one of the most gifted players ever. A fine attacker and equally strong in the middlegame and endgame, the term universal style was coined for him. For CBM 214 we invited our authors to comment on their favourite Boris Spassky games. The result is a collection of 27 first-class annotated Spassky games from the period 1949 to 1989. You can take a look at two samples here. Enjoy!