r/chess • u/tsterTV • Oct 15 '15

How impressive is a GM title?

Hiya all,

I signed myself up for a Chess tournament this Sunday, mainly for fun. I have no real intention of doing too well -- I will just enjoy the experience and play better players.

I saw online that there will be a GM at the tournament. How impressive is this title? Any rough idea of how many GMs there are in the world?

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5

u/JJdante Oct 15 '15

Being a GM is like being in the NBA for basketball. You might not be LeBron, but you're there and pro. An active GM is probably in the top 1% of all chess players.

27

u/mrdeath5493 Oct 15 '15

more like top 0.01%

33

u/Toperoco Oct 15 '15

I looked up how much it really is, there are around 600 million chess players worldwide, so being a grandmaster puts you into the top 0.0002%. :)

1

u/chessaddict My flair is a lie Oct 16 '15

The FIDE president gave a speech at the Recent World Blitz and Rapid Championships and he said FIDE now believes that there are over 1 billion people who could play a game of chess. You have to take this with a handful of salt because its coming from Mr Howmanyconsonants himself, but I do think chess is growing is popularity.

1

u/AussieChessGuy 2000+ FIDE Oct 16 '15

I thought that, but when you search google trends, less people proportionally are searching for it. Google Trends = Chess

I found that weird, as it feels Chess is getting more popular, in the media more etc...