Magnus Carlsen

Biography

Magnus Carlsen was born on 30 November 1990 in Tønsberg, Norway, and learned to play chess at age five, though he did not take the game seriously until around age eight. His rapid rise culminated in the grandmaster title on 17 March 2004, at 13 years and 148 days old — at the time the third-youngest GM in history. Within a decade he had rewritten the sport's record books.

Carlsen first topped the unofficial live rating list in January 2010 and became the official FIDE world number one on 1 July 2011, a position he has held without interruption ever since — the longest continuous reign atop the ratings in the history of the list, which dates to 1971. In May 2014 he pushed his rating to 2882, still the highest official rating ever recorded, surpassing Garry Kasparov's 2851 mark from July 1999.

Between 2013 and 2021 Carlsen won five World Chess Championship matches, defeating Viswanathan Anand twice, then Sergey Karjakin, Fabiano Caruana and Ian Nepomniachtchi. In 2023 he chose not to defend the classical title, saying he lacked motivation for the format, and has not competed in the championship cycle since — while remaining the world's highest-rated active player and the dominant force in rapid and blitz chess, where he holds more world titles than anyone else.

Key achievements

• World Chess Champion: 2013, 2014, 2016, 2018, 2021
• Highest official FIDE rating in history: 2882 (May 2014)
• Longest continuous run at FIDE world No. 1: since 1 July 2011
• Most World Rapid (6) and World Blitz (9) titles of any player

Ratings

Titles

* Shared title. Full year-by-year list not independently verified for every one of the 9 blitz titles.

Classical Tournaments

Team Events

Source: OlimpBase (olimpbase.org) individual Olympiad records, cross-checked with Wikipedia.

Read more on Wikipedia or view his FIDE profile.