New Speed Chess Championship To Feature 16 Top Players

The 2017 Chess.com Speed Chess Championship will seed 16 players into an elimination bracket for Chess.com's biggest annual tournament, with the first round of matches starting in May 2017.

UPDATE: Click here for updates and Round 1 schedule of matches!

A total of 15 top-flight matches will be played over the course of five months, with the winner besting a stacked field of super grandmasters through four grueling rounds to be crowned the speed chess champion and take home a large share of the $50,000 prize fund.

The prizes will be awarded as follows:

• Round 1 (16 players, 8 matches): $16,000. $1,000 to the winner of each match. $1,000 split between match winner and loser by total win percentage. 
• Round 2 (8 players, 4 matches): $12,000. $1,500 to the winner of each match. $1,500 split between match winner and loser by total win percentage. 
• Semi-Finals, Round 3 (4 players, 2 matches): $12,000. $3,000 to winner of each match. $3,000 split between match winner and loser by total win percentage.
• Finals, Round 4 (2 players, 1 match): $10,000. $5,000 to the winner, the title of speed chess champion and a trophy with name engraved. $5,000 split between match winner and loser by total win percentage.

The final four "Qualified" seeds will be the winners of the four Titled Tuesday qualifiers in April. 

Those April Titled Tuesdays will feature an increased prize pool, a new time slot, live master commentary, and the ultimate prize: four qualifying spots in the Speed Chess Championship bracket.

The Speed Chess Championship will run April-December, with the full schedule to be released at a later date on Chess.com/News.

The Speed Chess Championship will attempt to work with all the top players and their busy travel schedules to determine each match date, but you can trust the semifinals and finals will be announced far in advance. 

Watch Chess.com/news for updates about Chess.com's biggest tournament ever.

Signed Players as of February 6:

GM Magnus Carlsen:

GM Wesley So:

GM Fabiano Caruana:

GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave:

GM Levon Aronian:

GM Hikaru Nakamura: 

GM Sergey Karjakin:

GM Anish Giri:

 

GM Ian Nepomniachtchi: 

GM Alexander Grischuk: 

GM Richard Rapport: 

GM Hou Yifan: 

Stay tuned for more...