Women FIDE Freestyle Chess World Championships 2027
FIDE Freestyle Chess World Championship 2026
Nodirbek Abdusattorov claims final World Championship spot
The 21-year-old Uzbek wins the Play-In and completes the eight-player field for Weissenhaus
Hamburg / Weissenhaus, January 15, 2026 – Nodirbek Abdusattorov has claimed the eighth and final place at the FIDE Freestyle Chess World Championship, to be held in Weissenhaus, Germany, from February 13–15, 2026.
Abdusattorov won the official Play-In qualifier hosted by chess.com, defeating Pranav Venkatesh 2–0 in the final. The Play-In brought together more than 100 titled players from around the world and concluded with a four-player knockout stage on January 15.
Nodirbek Abdusattorov. | Photo: Lennart Ootes/Freestyle Chess
With his victory, Abdusattorov joins the seven players already qualified for the World Championship: Magnus Carlsen, Levon Aronian, Fabiano Caruana, Vincent Keymer, Arjun Erigaisi, Javokhir Sindarov, and Hans Niemann.
Abdusattorov brings extensive experience in the Freestyle and Chess960 formats, having previously reached the semifinals of the FIDE Fischer Random World Championship. In 2025, he competed in multiple events of the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour.
During the World Championship in Weissenhaus, a Freestyle Chess exhibition match between Hou Yifan and Bibisara Assaubayeva will be played on February 14 and 15.
The FIDE Freestyle Chess World Championship marks the first World Championship jointly staged by FIDE and Freestyle Chess, concluding the 2025 Freestyle Chess season and crowning the first World Champion under the new framework.
