The World Chess Championship 2024 match for the title will be played by reigning world champion Ding Liren and challenger Gukesh D between November 20 and December 15. The event will take place in Singapore. Ding Liren and Gukesh D will fight for 14 rounds, or the first one to reach 7.5 points. If they tie after 14 rounds, tie-breaks will decide who the new world chess champion will be.
Ding Liren
Ding Liren is the highest rated Chinese player of all time. His highest rating ever was 2816 in November of 2018. He has won many tournaments, including:
- World Chess Championship in 2023
- Chinese Championship (2009, 2011, and 2012)
- Chessable Masters 2022
- Grand Chess Tour 2019
- Sinquefield Cup 2019
- Moscow Grand Prix 2017
- Longgang Shenzhen Grandmaster Tournament 2017
Between August 2017 and November 2018 he was unbeaten, holding a 100-game unbeaten streak, which was a world record at the time (Magnus Carlsen beat it one year later).
Gukesh D
Gukesh D has always been a prodigy Indian chess star. He earned the Grandmaster title at the age of 12, and qualified for the World Chess Championship match at the age of 17.
He is the third youngest Grandmaster in the history, and the youngest player to reach a rating of 2750.
He is also the youngest player to beat Magnus Carlsen since Magnus became world champion.
The Road to the Match for the Title
Ding Liren is the defending world champion, so naturally he gets to defend his title. He became world champion in 2023 after beating Ian Nepomniachtchi in the tie-breaks.
Gukesh D qualified to the match after becoming the youngest player ever to win the Candidates Tournament this year. He is also the youngest challenger to the world title.
In the Candidates, Gukesh D got 5 wins, 8 draws, and 1 loss, winning with a difference of 0.5 points.
Previous Games Between Ding Liren and Gukesh D
In the head to head between both of them, Ding Liren leads by 2.5 to 0.5.
The most recent game between the two of them was in January of 2024 in the 86th Tata Steel Masters. They played an Italian Game, and the winner after 37 moves was Ding Liren with black.
Here’s the game:
The other two games between them were in the Tata Steel Masters 2023, and in the Goldmoney Asian 2021.
Last Match for the Title
In 2023, Ding Liren had to fight for more than 20 days to finally be able to defeat Nepo and become world champion.
During the classical part of the match, each player won 3 games, and they drew the other 8 games.
In the tie-breaks, they drew the first games, and only on the 4th and last game of the tie-break Ding Liren managed to get an advantage and get the win.
Format
As we said before, the match will be to the best of 14 classical games.
Each player will have 120 minutes to make their moves. After the first 40 moves, they get 60 more minutes for the next 20 moves. After move 60, they get an extra 15 minutes and an extra 30 seconds after each move.
In case players want to draw the game, they can only do it after move 40.