Who is the best chess player?

Reverse historical order would probably be closer to the truth. Nobody thinks the quality of the top chess players has been declining.

Everybody has their primes, even in chess. I really think that Magnus has brought a new level to the game. Highest rating at 2882, achieved by Magnus.

Being the world champion does not make you the best player. This year's FIDE tournament didn't even hold some of the highest rated players, not because they're bad, but because they simply didn't try to achieve the title.

It's worth noting, that Ian Nepomniachtchi had chance to become current world champion but he lost to Ding Liren. Magnus Carlsen did not participate in the last championship (was not interested to defend his title).

Also here is a list of world chess champions that are still alive:

1. Boris Spassky
2. Anatoly Karpov
3. Garry Kasparov
4. Vladimir Kramnik
5. Viswanathan Anand
6. Magnus Carlsen
7. Ding Liren

Magnus

It's not a one year thing. Many world champions were undisputed for several years straight. If someone decides to quit or can't participate, how can we know that he is still best. Ratings? They fluctuate a lot. And even farming is possible thanks to 400-point rule. But champion is champion.

The current world champion is Ding Liren, but his rating is nowhere near Magnus's. You are correct in saying that the rating fluctuate a lot, but then again, Magnus has been at the top for a LONG time. Upon this, who knows if Ding will even keep his title, I personally believe that Gukesh has the better chance at winning.

Rating is not everything. It's only an estimate, a prediction and this prediction is never perfect.

Jeff Sonas has even found that ratings are consistently inaccurate:

That basically means that most higher rated players perform worse than their ratings suggests.

And there are individual "incompatibilities" that contribute to inaccuracy of the prediction.

If player#1 defeats player#2 60% of the time and player #2 defeats player #3 60% of the time, can you predict how often player #1 would defeat player #3? You would of course immediately think 69.23%, but in reality that doesn't always happen, because player #1 could have some weakness that player #3 could exploit more effectively than player#2 despite being a weaker player in general, so it could be suddenly something like 62% only. Also what's not tracked is how quickly opponent car learn something about your style from playing against you and how effectively he could exploit that. How well an opponent can prepare to the game by examining your past games. Ratings fail to reflect all that. If you're playing against others but not so often against some specific, lower rated player, actual match between you and that player might have a very surprising outcome. Following rating adjustment will not bring too much accuracy and if you will keep playing against that player, your rating difference to OTHER players will start becoming less and less accurate.

Ratings meant to be used as predictions but they are always one step back.

Gukesh:

In general, I don't believe in predictions and who are the favorites, etc. I just think that whoever is able to show up every day as the best will win the game eventually. I'm just focusing on the process, and I try to just be at my best every day and play a good game. I just want to enjoy the experience.

Well said, but when you are trying to find out who the best player is, you can't compare every player to every other player. I think that when one tries to define who the best player is, he just focuses on who has the best knowledge, and utilization of the knowledge he has of the game. It is not so much a matter of every single game outcome that has ever been, but more a matter of who, generally speaking, has the better gameplay.

The best female player is Vera Menchic. First female super GM and very aggressive playstyle

I see what Gukesh is implying when he made this statement, but even so, it can inevitably be said that there is a player who actually IS better than all the other players. Sure, it's not a big deal, and as Gukesh said, he doesn't believe in favorites and such, he just tries to win, but that doesn't nullify the fact that there is a player at the top of the stack.

Probably Magnus Carlsen since he has reached a rating higher than anyone in history

That is what I said, but what basketstorm said should be taken into account. Ratings don't mean everything.

If ratings didn't mean anything then nobody would use them... It is actually the closest we have gotten to calculating skill... So what he said is actually completely false

Ratings are based off of your wins and gameplay... Oh sorry #36 I thought you said "ratings don't mean anything" lol

It is true that they don't mean everything

My bad basketstorm... But also as they are not fine tuned, ratings are very good at separating skill difference in larger chunks suck as 100 points apart or so

That is not true. I didn't say that HE said that ratings don't mean ANYTHING, he said that ratings don't mean EVERYTHING, which is true. You are correct in saying that ratings are the closest thing that we have to estimating a player's general skill, but there are other ways, such as direct analyzation.

That second part is most definitely valid, as well as extremely relevant, JOK-E-R.

Let’s be honest we all know it’s tobuvw…

According to me, it was Garry Kasparov in the olden times, but now it has to be between Hikaru or Carlsen. But it really depends on whose playing style you like the most.