Parimarjan Negi
Born 9 February 1993 · Delhi
Achieved the grandmaster title at age 13 years, 4 months, and 20 days, second youngest then.
🔔 Add birthday reminderParimarjan Negi is an Indian chess grandmaster. He achieved the grandmaster title at the age of 13 years, 4 months, and 20 days, which made him the second youngest grandmaster in history at the time. As of June 2025, he is the ninth youngest player to achieve this feat.
✨ A detail that surprised us
Parimarjan Negi became a grandmaster by surpassing Magnus Carlsen’s record by five days, achieving the title at 13 years, 4 months, and 20 days old in 2006.
1. In 2006, at just 13 years, 4 months, and 20 days old, Parimarjan Negi clinched his final grandmaster norm by drawing with GM Ruslan Shcherbakov in Satka, Russia, making him the second youngest grandmaster ever at that time.
2. 🏆 At age 9, Negi won the under-10 division of the Asian Youth Chess Championship in Tehran (2002), setting an early marker for his international chess potential.
3. In 2010, the Government of India honored Negi with the Arjuna Award, recognizing his accomplishments including the 48th National Premier Chess Championship title he won in New Delhi in 2010.
4. 🌏 Negi led India’s top board during the 2014 Chess Olympiad in Tromsø, Norway, where the Indian team secured a bronze medal, their best performance at that event.
5. 📚 Between 2014 and 2016, Negi authored a detailed series of chess books dissecting 1.e4 openings against defenses like the French, Caro-Kann, Philidor, and Sicilian, contributing to chess literature with deep opening theory analysis.
6. Despite reaching a peak FIDE rating of 2671 in October 2013, Negi retired from professional chess by 2017 to pursue academics, later graduating with a Mathematics degree from Stanford University in 2018.
7. ❓ How did Parimarjan Negi’s transition from chess prodigy to computer science PhD student at MIT reshape perceptions of career trajectories for young Indian grandmasters?
Awards & Honours
- 🏅Arjuna Award
🔍 One thing most people don't know
Negi earned his final grandmaster norm in Satka, Russia, by drawing against GM Ruslan Shcherbakov on July 1, 2006, a match crucial to breaking India’s youngest GM record.
🖼️ Through the Years
📅 The Journey
🗝️ Discoveries
🎥 Speeches & Recordings
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📖 Curated Sources
🌱 What changed because of them
Parimarjan Negi’s record-breaking grandmaster title at a young age inspired a new generation of Indian chess talents, including Praggnanandhaa and Gukesh, accelerating India’s emergence on the global chess stage. His academic shift to Stanford and MIT helped bridge intellectual pursuits in chess with advanced computer science research, influencing the growing trend of chess players engaging deeply with AI and systems research.
💬 Social Buzz
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