The FIDE Chess World Cup will be held in Goa, India, from 31 October to 27 November. D Gukesh will be the top seed and will be leading a 24-member Indian contingent, which also includes wild card entry Divya Deshmukh. Meanwhile, Arjun Erigaisi and R Praggnanandhaa are the second and third seeds.
Defending champion Magnus Carlsen won’t be in action, as he has skipped the event. The tournament takes place every two years, and even the Candidates 2026 berths are at stake. The top three players will qualify for the tournament next year, which is a qualifier for the World C’ship match against Gukesh.
FIDE Chess World Cup 2025: What is the format?
The tournament is an eight-round knockout event and the top 50 seeds are given a bye into the second round. Meanwhile, the losers of the two semifinals will face each other in a match for third place.
Each round will have a classical time limit on the first two days, and tie-breaks will be added on the third day if needed. There will be two classical time limit games consisting of 90 minutes each side for the first 40 moves, then an extra 30 minutes will be added for the rest of the game, and with a 30-second increment per move starting from move. If needed, rapid format tie-breaks will take place on the third day of each round. Each round will last three days (two for classical time control games and if tie-breaks are needed, then a third).
Where will the FIDE Chess World Cup 2025 take place?
The FIDE Chess World Cup 2025 will take place at Resort Rio in North Goa.
FIDE Chess World Cup 2025: Schedule and time
All matches will start at 3 PM IST.
Round 1: November 1-2
Round 2: November 4-6
Round 3: November 7-9
Round 4: November 11-13
Round 5: November 14-16
Quarterfinals: November 17-19
Semifinals: November 21-23
Finals: November 24-26
FIDE Chess World Cup 2025: Full list of Indians
D Gukesh (Seed 1)
Arjun Erigaisi (Seed 2)
R Praggnanandhaa (Seed 3)
Vidit Gujrathi (Seed 19)
Aravindh Chithambaram (Seed 20)
Nihal Sarin (Seed 22)
Pentala Harikrishna (Seed 24)
Karthikeyan Murali (Seed 38)
Pranav V (Seed 60)
Sadhwani Raunak (Seed 62)
Pranesh M (Seed 70)
Mendonca Leon Luke (Seed 78)
Narayanan SL (Seed 81)
Iniyan Pa (Seed 92)
Karthik Venkataraman (Seed 109)
Diptayan Ghosh (Seed 117)
Ganguly Surya Shekhar (Seed 118)
Raja Rithvik R (Seed 129)
Aronyak Ghosh (Seed 143)
Lalit Baby MR (Seed 149)
Divya Deshmukh (WILD CARD) (Seed 150)
Gusain Himal (Seed 159)
Harshavardhan GB (Seed 160)
Neelash Saha (Seed 163)
Where to watch live telecast of the FIDE Chess World Cup 2025?
There will be no live telecast of the FIDE Chess World Cup 2025 in India.
Where to watch live streaming of the FIDE Chess World Cup 2025?
The live streaming of the FIDE Chess World Cup 2025 will be available on FIDe’s official YouTube channel.
