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Geneva has been chosen to host this year’s world chess championship match, with Fide announcing on Tuesday that reigning champion Gukesh Dommaraju will defend his title against challenger Javokhir Sindarov in the Swiss city from 25 November to 15 December.
Both Gukesh, of India, and Sindarov, of Uzbekistan, will be 20 when the best-of-14-games match begins, making it the youngest world championship encounter since the title was first contested in 1886.
Fide said several countries, including India, the United States and Cyprus, had expressed interest in hosting the match before the governing body opted for Geneva.
“After carefully considering all the proposals, Fide has decided to stage the match on neutral soil and bring it to Geneva, a city with a historic tradition of bringing nations and cultures together,” Fide interim president Viswanathan Anand said in a statement.
“We look forward to welcoming the global chess community to Switzerland. The local chess fans will have the opportunity to experience world-class chess in person, while millions of fans around the globe can follow the battle online as the duel for the highest title in chess unfolds.”
The Swiss Chess Federation hailed the decision, calling it a landmark moment for the game in the country. Switzerland last hosted a world championship match in 2004, when Vladimir Kramnik defeated Peter Leko in Brissago.
Sindarov earned the right to challenge for the crown by winning this year’s Candidates tournament in Cyprus with a round to spare. The Uzbek grandmaster finished unbeaten with six wins and seven draws from 13 games, sealing first place after a 58-move draw with Anish Giri and underlining the accelerating shift toward a younger generation at the top of the game.
The eight-man tournament had been billed as a potential last stand for the established elite, but Americans Fabiano Caruana and Hikaru Nakamura never mounted a sustained challenge as Sindarov produced one of the most commanding Candidates performances in recent memory.
Gukesh became the youngest world champion in history when he defeated China’s Ding Liren in Singapore in December 2024 at the age of 18, breaking the previous record held by Garry Kasparov. Their showdown had marked the first time in the 138-year history of world championship matchplay that two men from Asia competed for the sport’s most prestigious title. Now it will happen for a second world title match in a row.
Despite having abdicated the title in 2023, Magnus Carlsen remains the world’s highest-rated player. The 35-year-old Norwegian has held the No 1 ranking for more than 16 years but declined to defend his world championship following his fourth successful defense, saying he no longer had the motivation for the months-long slog of preparation required for title matches. Ding won the crown vacated by Carlsen before losing it to Gukesh the following year.
While Sindarov arrives after a breakthrough year, Gukesh enters the match searching for form. The 20-year-old has endured a prolonged slump in classical chess, finishing near the bottom of the standings at the Tata Steel Masters and Prague International Chess Festival before placing last at Norway Chess and the Chennai Grand Masters.
The Indian grandmaster failed to win a single game in Chennai, drawing four and losing three, extending a run of disappointing results that has seen him drop to No 26 in the world and raised doubts over his chances of retaining the title despite becoming the youngest world champion in history less than two years ago.
The world championship match will consist of 14 classical games with each player awarded one point for a win and a half-point for a draw. Whoever reaches seven and a half points first will be declared the champion. Fide said further details on the schedule, prize fund, ticketing and exact venue will be announced at a later date.
English (US) ·