7/3/2023 – At the beginning of the month, FIDE published its new rating list. Magnus Carlsen, who lost 18 Elo points at Norway Chess in June, remains at the top of the list with 2835 points and is also the only player with an Elo rating above 2800. The Americans Hikaru Nakamura (2787, +12 at Norway Chess) and Fabiano Caruana (2782, +9 at Norway Chess) are in second and third place.

2/2/2022 – FIDE has published the new world ranking list. Since hardly any tournaments were played in January and the Tata Steel tournament was not taken into account for the February list, there are virtually no changes at the top. Magnus Carlsen continues to be the world's number one with a huge margin, Alireza Firouzja is in second place and the only other player with a rating of +2800.

11/1/2021 – The FIDE published its new rating list. Magnus Carlsen remains number one and is now the only player with 2800+. Fabiano Caruana lost a couple of points in the US Championship and is now below 2800 and the world's number three, behind Ding Liren. Hou Yifan does not play often but remains the world's best women. Best junior is Alireza Firouzja, best girl Polina Shuvalova.

10/1/2021 – The FIDE world ranking lists in October 2021 are headed by the "usual suspects". With a rating of 2855 Magnus Carlsen is still the clear number one, but though he played 13 rated games in September he did not win or lose any points. Alireza Firouzja is still the best junior, but for the first time he is now also among the world's top ten. Hou Yifan continues to lead the women's ranking list and Polina Shuvalova remains the highest rated player on the "Girls" list.

3/2/2021 – So far, the Tata Steel Tournament in Wijk aan Zee was the only over-the-board top tournament this year. It was played in the second half of January, but its results did not affect the rating list of February 2021. But Wijk changed the rating list from March 2021: Magnus Carlsen and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave lost points, other players gained rating.

11/5/2020 – In the last months only a few over-the-board tournaments took place, but in October 30 of the top 100 players were active again and played in FIDE-rated "real" tournaments. Magnus Carlsen is still the clear number one but it was Alireza Firouzja who made the biggest jump ahead by gaining 20 Elo-points in Stavanger.

5/16/2020 – Online chess has become very popular in the last couple of years and more and more people participate and try to win games and achieve a higher rating. Rating matters so much that it can turn into an obsession. Ratings appear to represent the value of the person. We take a closer look at how the ego can become the curse of the rating system and how we feel about it.

3/1/2020 – With the 2020 Candidates looming, there were few tournaments held in February to attract the world's top grandmasters, with two notable exceptions in Prague and Saint Louis. Alireze Firouzja (pictured) was the winner at the Prague Masters and Humpy Koneru took the second annual Cairns Cup. Gibraltar was also rated in February and provides the only change to the top 10: Maxime Vachier-Lagrave notched up one spot back to number eight, while Shakhriyar Mamedyarov slips to the tenth position after withdrawing prematurely due to illness. | Photo: Vladimir Jagr

2/1/2020 – Fabiano Caruana did phenomenally at the Tata Steel Chess Tournament in Wijk aan Zee and was able to reduce his Elo distance to World Champion Magnus Carlsen from 50 to 20 points — Carlsen now stands at 2862 and Caruana at 2842. Ju Wenjun remained Women's World Champion, and world number two. Firouzja won the Juniors battle in the Tata Steel Masters, and Zhansaya Abdumalik maintains a healthy lead in among the top girls. | Pictured: Caruana watches the game Firouzja vs Dubov | Photo: Alina l'Ami

1/1/2020 – Happy New Year! World Champion Magnus Carlsen heads into 2020 with a 50 Elo point lead in the classical ratings and a 45 point lead on the rapid list. Yet, despite winning the recent World Blitz Championship in a playoff over Hikaru Nakamura, the American clings to a 13 point margin atop the world blitz rankings. Alireza Firouzja, who gave both a run for their money in Moscow, is now #1 on the Juniors rankings. | Photos: Amruta Mokal / Jingda Chen on Unsplash

12/1/2019 – The December rating list is out, with Magnus Carlsen back at number one in rapid, in addition to classical chess. Hikaru Nakamura, however, remains atop the world blitz rankings. They pair will have a chance to clash in both rapid and blitz formats later this month in Moscow. Alexander Grischuk (pictured) is now nearly sure of a 2020 Candidates qualification spot after his win in the Hamburg Grand Prix tournament. | Photo: Valeria Gordienko

11/1/2019 – The November rating list is out and reflects the performances of two of the most important tournaments on the calendar this year: The World Cup and the Grand Swiss, both qualifying events for the 2020 Candidates tournament which attracted a massive turnout of elite players. Every member of the top 40 was in action in the rating period except for the retired Vladimir Kramnik, Richard Rapport and Veselin Topalov. | Pictured: World Cup winner Teimour Radjabov, runner-up Ding Liren, third place finisher Maxime Vachier-Lagrave and fourth placed Yu Yangyi at the close of the Khanty-Mansiysk festivities. | Photo: FIDE

10/1/2019 – The October rating list is out and with most of the world's best occupied in Khanty-Mansiysk at the World Cup (which is not yet rated), the changes there will only be reflected in November. Therefore the women are in focus this month, as most of the best were busy doing battle on the outskirts of Moscow in the first event of the newest FIDE Grand Prix. A notable exception is China's Zhu Jiner who was busy too, but in her home country, where she quietly slipped into the Top 10. | Pictured: The closing ceremony of the FIDE Women's Grand Prix in Skolkovo, Russia | Photo: Boris Dolmatovsky

9/1/2019 – The eleven rounds of the Sinquefield Cup have already been incorporated into the latest FIDE rating list, published today. World Champion Magnus Carlsen continues to reign supreme at number one in the world rankings with 2876 Elo points, and Fabiano Caruana (2812) and Ding Liren (2811) remain in second and third places respectively. The gaps have narrowed, however: Carlsen and Caruana each lost 6 Elo points in the Sinquefield Cup, while Ding Liren ticked up the same amount. | Pictured: Garry Kasparov gives remarks at the Sinquefield Cup prize giving, one of five players in this frame who are or have been over 2800. | Photo: Austin Fuller / Grand Chess Tour

8/1/2019 – World Champion Magnus Carlsen hit an Elo rating of 2882 in May 2014. Five years later, he's back at that exact same number on the official August list, and arguably stronger than ever, following a string of successes in the first seven months of 2019. Alireza Firouzja and Jeffrey Xiong are two top Juniors now over 2700, and Ju Wenjun has narrowed the gap between herself and Hou Yifan to 59 points. | Photo: Justin Kellar / Grand Chess Tour

7/1/2019 – Our monthly look at the FIDE ratings for July2019 with a focus on the outcome of the Women's Candidates tournament won by 20-year old Russian phenom Aleksandra Goryachkina (pictured). In blitz, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave has taken the #1 spot away from World Champion Magnus Carlsen thanks to his Norway Chess blitz win. And 58-year old GM Igors Rausis continues his improbable climb up the raking list by bashing much weaker players. | Photo: Eteri Kublashvili

6/3/2019 – Our monthly look at the FIDE ratings for June 2019 starts with World Champion Magnus Carlsen, who has a chance to break his own all-time rating record this month. That would go a long way towards cementing a claim on the greatest-of-all-time honours. Pictured, however, is Cuban-born Leinier Dominguez, who now plays for the USA, and after a long hiatus is now knocking on the door of the Top 10 at 2760, just 8 points shy of his personal peak rating. That was set back in May 2014, when he briefly hit 2768. Do you know who else was at his peak that month five years ago? Magnus Carlsen! | Photo: Justin Kellar / Saint Louis Chess Club

5/1/2019 – World Champion Magnus Carlsen has gained 40 Elo points in the 27 games of his last three tournaments. But the Grenke Chess Classic unfortunately did not make the cut-off for FIDE's May ratings. Still, at 2861 he's put considerable distance between himself and #2 Fabiano Caruana. Hou Yifan and Women's World Champion Ju Wenjun retain a huge lead in the Women's World rankings as the upcoming Candidates tournament for the next challenger is set to start at the end of May. | Photo: Georgios Souleidis

4/25/2019 – After winning in Shamkir, Carlsen’s live rating was up to 2861, his best since June 2015. After five rounds in Grenke, that's exactly where he remains today (well 2861.6 to be precise!). IM SAGAR SHAH recently took a look at how he's climbing back towards his all-time peak. | Photo: Georgios Souleidis (author of The Open Games - A detailed overview)

4/3/2019 – April ratings came out like clockwork on Sunday night. Our own internal PlayerBase update — not so much. Apologies for the delay in our monthly tour through the Elo lists. Of special interest on the April list: 28 players from the Top 100 exhibited rating swings of +/- 10 Elo points or more — a rare occurrence. Pictured: Ju Wenjun, David Anton Guijarro, Jan Krejci, winners at the Prague Challengers. | Photo: Macauley Peterson

3/1/2019 – FIDE's March ratings reflect changes from the Gibraltar Masters, the Cairns Cup and Champions Showdown in St. Louis. Vladislav Artemiev took a big step up the classical list after his Gibraltar win. Valentina Gunina can point to her fine performance in the USA to justify her re-entrance into the top 10 among women. And Fabiano Caruana showed that he really has worked on his rapid chess. | Photo: Lennart Ootes

2/27/2019 – Which are the commonest words in the English language, which are the most common girls' and boys' names? Today it is possible to calculate these things fairly easily, but it becomes really useful if you are able to present the results in a comprehensible way. Like with dynamic graphs and bubbling. This was done very nicely for historical chess strength in 2016 by Abacaba, a site that makes videos about data and math. Now a YouTube channel called TheRanker has published a 10-minute video visualisation tracking official FIDE ratings from 2000 to the present. It is informative, interesting and even relaxing to watch.

2/1/2019 – February ratings are out with changes resulting mainly from the Tata Steel Chess tournament. Gibraltar ended just past the cutoff time, so this month's update is, to a certain extent, already out of date. Carlsen is, of course, still first on all three lists. He is at his highest point since November 2016. Anish Giri, at 2797, is just one point shy of his career best, and Jan Nepomniachtchi has set a new career peak for himself at 2771. | Photo: Alina l'Ami

1/1/2019 – FIDE's January ratings are out and saw a few big moves in the top 100 rapid and blitz lists thanks to the recently completed World Rapid and Blitz Championships. Carlsen's blitz dominance was on display and he solidified the top rating spot, now at 2954. Daniil Dubov gained notoriety (and rating) for his impressive run in the World Rapid Championship. Among the women, Ju Wenjun took her third world title of the year, but Kateryna Lagno, who lost the World Championship final in a blitz tiebreaker against Ju, managed to win the Blitz Championship well ahead of her rival. | Pictured: Women's World Blitz Champion, Kateryna Lagno | Photo: Lennart Ootes