World Chess Championship 2021

The World Chess Championship 2021 is a chess match between reigning world champion Magnus Carlsen and challenger Ian Nepomniachtchi to determine the World Chess Champion. It is held under the auspices of FIDE, the International Chess Federation, and played in Dubai, United Arab Emirates, between 24 November and 16 December 2021.

The match is a best-of-14 match, with tie breaks. The prize fund is US$ 2 million split 60/40 (55-45 in case of tie-breaks). Time control is 120 minutes for the first 40 moves followed by 60 minutes for the next 20 moves and 15 minutes for the rest of the game with increments of 15 seconds per move starting on move 61.

Welcome to the World Chess Championship! If you are a chess fan, you will have a thrilling November! If you are just discovering chess, who has never visited or followed the Match and you do not know a Scholar’s Mate from a Sicilian Defense*, don’t worry. The Match is going to be exciting for everyone and you will likely have a great time following the adventure.

A little background might help. Chess is a 1500-year-old game that was invented in what is modern-day India. (The original game had some differences, like elephants instead of bishops and not all of the pieces moved the same way, but those are just details). The game spread through Persia (modern-day Iran), before entering Europe through the Iberian Peninsula sometime in the 9th century. From there, the game spread far and wide, soon becoming the most popular in Europe and even becoming part of the chivalric code in some countries (in other words, a real knight had to demonstrate prowess in chess). The current rules of the game were codified at the end of the 15th century in books written in Spain and Italy.

Today, Yougov, the polling and research company, estimates that about 600 million people know how to play the game and chess apps have been downloaded more than one billion times. Chess has made the transition from ancient “game of kings” to modern fixture of the Internet-age seamlessly. Indeed, as chess lends itself to being played on the Internet, there are now many Internet sites where people play regularly, day and night. In short, the game is more popular than ever.

Further proof of how the Internet has affected chess is that the current world champion, Magnus Carlsen, 30, is from Norway, a country with little chess tradition. But, growing up, Carlsen always had access to competition, which allowed him to rapidly perfect his skills. He became a grandmaster, the highest title awarded by the World Chess Federation, at 13 — one of the youngest ever.

Carlsen’s challenger, Ian Nepomniachtchi of Russia, is also a product of the Internet age. He is 31 and learned to play while growing up in Bryansk. Nepomniachtchi has the best score against Carlsen of all people and therefore is a very worthy challenger.

Carlsen and Nepomniachtchi are currently ranked Nos. 1 and 4, respectively, in the world. So, the upcoming match will be the chess world’s version of Muhammad Ali vs. Joe Frazier. So let's watch together -- sign up to the Telegram channel with the latest news, alerts and results from the match the moment they happen.

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Magnus Carlsen
Full name:Magnus Carlsen
Born:Nov 30, 1990 (age 30)
Place of birth:Tønsberg, Norway
Federation:Norway

GM Magnus Carlsen is the current world chess champion. To many people, he’s the best to ever play the game, although GMs Garry Kasparov and Bobby Fischer remain in the conversation. At any rate, the clear and remarkable point is that before turning 30 years old, Carlsen has already earned a spot at the top.

It’s easy to see why. The 13-year-old Norwegian prodigy drew Kasparov and defeated GM Anatoly Karpov at the same event in 2004, one month before he became the second-youngest GM in history. In 2009, he became the youngest player to break the 2800-rating threshold.

Then Carlsen transitioned from young world-class player to all-time great. He captured the world number-one ranking in 2011 and still hasn’t let go of it. He won the world title and successfully defended it three times. Additionally, he has won multiple world titles in rapid (twice) and blitz (four times) time controls, achieved the highest rating ever, and racked up several elite tournament wins, including two Norway Chess victories and seven in Wijk aan Zee.

The amazing part is it seems like there’s much more ahead for Carlsen. In October 2020 Carlsen's 125-game undefeated streak came to an end (he scored 42 wins and 83 draws during this streak), setting yet another world record. If he continues performing the way he has, Carlsen could create something truly legendary. In an era of chess that’s more competitive than ever, he’s far ahead of the opposition.

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GM Ian Nepomniachtchi
GM Ian Nepomniachtchi (“Nepo” for short) is a Russian super grandmaster who won the 2020/21 Candidates Tournament and will face GM Magnus Carlsen for the world championship.

Nepomniachtchi has a brilliant record against world champions. At standard time controls, he has positive scores against GM Vladimir Kramnik (+5 -4 =4), GM Viswanathan Anand (+3 -2 =5) and even Carlsen (+4 -1 =6, with two wins coming during their youth careers). He also has positive records against GM Anatoly Karpov (+2 -0 =0 in 2013) and GM Garry Kasparov (+1 -0 =2 in 2017) in rapid/blitz, the only formats he has played them in.

A Chess.com member, Nepomniachtchi plays under the account lachesisq.

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CountDown

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Shedule

Month	Day	Time	Event
November	24 We	18:00	Opening ceremony/technical meeting
	25 Th	-	Media day
	26 Fr	14:30	Game 1
	27 Sa	14:30	Game 2
	28 Su	14:30	Game 3
	29 Mo	-	Free day
	30 Tu	14:30	Game 4
December	1 We	14:30	Game 5
	2 Th	14:30	Free day
	3 Fr	14:30	Game 6
	4 Sa	14:30	Game 7
	5 Su	14:30	Game 8
	6 Mo	14:30	Free day
	7 Tu	14:30	Game 9
	8 We	14:30	Game 10
	9 Th	-	Free Day
	10 Fr	14:30	Game 11
	11 Sa	14:30	Game 12
	12 Su	14:30	Game 13
	13 Mo	-	Free Day
	14 Tu	14:30	Game 14
	15 We	14:30	TieBreak or Closing Ceremony
	16 Th	14:30	Closing Ceremony in case of tie Break