The World Chess Championship 2012 was a match between the defending world champion Viswanathan Anand of India and challenger Boris Gelfand of Israel, winner of the World Championship Candidates Knock-Out Tournament.¹

	Ready to start game number four.

The match took place from May 10 to 30, 2012, in the Engineering Building of the State Tretyakov Gallery in Moscow. The prize fund was approximately 2.5 million US dollars.

The match format was 12 games, with the first game on May 11. The normal FIDE tiebreak protocol was in place: should the match be tied 6-6 tiebreaks would first employing rapid games, then blitz games, and finally an Armageddon game if needed. The time controls for the classical games was 120 minutes for the first 40 moves, add 60 minutes after move 40, add 15 minutes and the increment +30s/move after move 60.

The first half of the match saw the players tied after six fairly short draws. Gelfand drew first blood in game seven, in which Anand made some provocative or inaccurate moves and Gelfand held a commanding position. The very next day, revenge was had ingame eight when Gelfand got his queen trapped on move 17--the shortest loss in WCC history! Then after four more draws, the match headed into overtime. Remarkably, only one of the first 12 games (#9) had lasted long enough to reach the time control at move 40.

Known for his prowess at rapid play, Anand was the clear favorite going into tiebreaks. After a see-saw victory in the second rapid game, and two more complicated draws, Viswanathan Anand defended his title once again.