GM Javokhir Sindarov goes into the 2026 Salesforce FIDE World Championship against reigning champion GM Gukesh Dommaraju with a lead of 72 rating points and 22 places on the November FIDE rating list. The biggest climber near the top of the list was GM Nihal Sarin, whose 2859 performance in the European Club Cup took him up to a career-best world number-19, while a casualty was GM Hans Niemann, who dropped out of the 2700 club after a disappointing U.S. Championship.

The women's top-10 rankings stayed unchanged, but the U.S. Women's Championship caused wild swings—IM Alice Lee climbed to 14th and took over as the U.S. women's number-one, IM Carissa Yip dropped 31 points, while winner WIM Rachael Li climbed 50 points. The standout women's performance, however, was by FM Bodhana Sivanandan, who earned the international master title and is the seventh youngest IM, male or female, of all time. 

Despite a number of top players being in action in October, the rankings at the top were left almost unchanged—GM Wei Yi edged above GM Vincent Keymer into eighth place after a strong showing in the European Club Cup, but has since dipped below the German number-one after three draws in the Chinese League. 

FIDE Classical Ratings Top 100: November 2026

Sindarov and Gukesh didn't play classical chess—though Sindarov climbed to world number-two on the rapid list after winning Clutch Chess: Champions Showdown—but we now know their official ratings and rankings going into their 14-game match in Geneva in a little over three weeks' time.

Defending champion Gukesh is rated 2710, making him 26th in the world, 22 spots and 72 rating points behind world number-four Sindarov, who has a 2782 rating. The gap of 72 points isn't that unusual for a world championship match—we've seen Carlsen with 74, 81, and 95-point leads before his matches against GMs Ian Nepomniachtchi, Sergey Karjakin, and Viswanathan Anand, but the 22-place difference is a record in matches since the world championship title was unified in 2006.   

Rating/Ranking Gap Before World Championship Matches 

Gukesh is the lowest-ranked player to compete in the chess world's most important match in the period, while previously no-one has won from a ranking below world number-five—only GM Ding Liren in 2023 and Anand in 2010 defied rating at all. Still, Gukesh himself had a 55-point and 18-place advantage over Ding going into the previous world championship match but only won at the end of the final classical game, while Carlsen's 81-point advantage over Karjakin in 2016 didn't stop him having to come from behind at the end and win in a playoff. We can expect a huge fight!

The November rating list, meanwhile, is a personal landmark for 22-year-old Nihal, with the Indian grandmaster up to a career-best 19th after scoring 5/6 and taking gold on board two in the European Club Cup in Budva, Montenegro.

It was a tough event for some other top players. GM Anish Giri (-5) ended on a high by beating GM Nodirbek Abdusattorov (-8) to win the title for his team, but had earlier lost to 20-year-old Indian GMs Pranav Venkatesh and Pranesh M. 

Abdusattorov also lost to GM Aydin Suleymanli (+13), though he did pick up an impressive win over his namesake, GM Nodirbek Yakubboev (-11), who just hung on in the 2700 club. In the end, we also saw the first rating loss in a long time for GM Yagiz Kaan Erdogmus (-12), who finished the event as the world number-21 after hitting world number-15 midway through. 

The other major event to impact the rating list was the U.S. Championship, but surprisingly So's victory over Caruana barely changed the standings at the top, since a loss in round 11 saw So gain just one rating point, leaving him a point behind Abdusattorov.

It mattered more for the FIDE Circuit, which will decide two spots in the next Candidates Tournament. So earned 17.76 points to move within a couple of points of Sindarov, while Caruana climbed to third place after earning 15.89 for taking second after the playoff. 

FIDE Circuit 2026-2027: Top 5 (November 1, 2026)

Other players in the 11-round event experienced big rating changes, including gains for GMs Grigoriy Oparin (+18), Andy Woodward (+16), and Jeffery Xiong (+15), while GM Sam Sevian dropped 24 points to 2684 despite the final-round win. The most notable player to drop below 2700, however, was GM Hans Niemann, who lost four games and won one as he dropped 20 points and 10 places to world number-32 and 2697.   

GMs Aleksandra Goryachkina and Koneru Humpy edged up slightly after their Cercle d'Echecs de Monte-Carlo team won the 2026 European Women's Club Cup, but the top 10 remained the same.

🏆 Delighted to win the European Chess Club Cup Women 2026 with Cercle d’Echecs de Monte-Carlo! 🇲🇨♟️ My association with this wonderful club started in 2007 and has always been special, and I’m proud to be part of its journey. A fantastic team effort and a memorable victory alongside such wonderful teammates ❤️ #ECCC2026 #Chess

— Koneru Humpy ( @humpy_koneru) October 23, 2026

FIDE Classical Ratings Top 100 Women | November 2026

That's no longer quite true, since GMs Lei Tingjie (-19.3) and Tan Zhongyi (-9.6) both suffered in this weekend's Chinese League, which will only impact the official ratings on December 1. That helped Goryachkina and GM Bibisara Assaubayeva climb a spot each.

The most dramatic single event to affect the women's standings, however, was the U.S. Women's Championship, surprisingly won by 16-year-old WIM Li, who gained a whopping 50 points and climbed 35 spots to world number-31 and a 2430 rating. At the same time, Yip, who was gunning for a fifth title in six years, instead crashed to five losses, dropping nine places and 31 ratings points.

Lee, who finished second, gained seven points to move to world number-14, become the U.S. women's number-one, and, at 2474, is within sight of the 2500 needed as part of the requirements for the grandmaster title. 

Other players to have stellar months include IM Eline Roebers, who gained 28 points, and FM Beloslava Krasteva, who gained 72 points in the Serbian Super League and was close to becoming the Bulgarian women's number-one before a slip-up in the European Club Cup that limited her to a 61-point gain and the number-two spot.

The star, however, was again 11-year-old Sivanandan, who gained 31 points in the European Club Cup, crossed 2400 (she's now women's world number-39!), and completed her third and final IM norm. She broke a 38-year-old record set by the great GM Judit Polgar, but the main takeaway is that, as with Polgar, she's very special not only as a female chess player but compared with the world's very best.

As she explained herself, however, she has bigger goals.

11-year-old Bodhana Sivanandan on becoming the 7th youngest player ever to earn the IM title: "I’m happy about that, but hopefully I’m able to get grandmaster soon as well!" https://t.co/BjwfzpYuL3

— chess24 ( @chess24com) October 23, 2026

Another prodigy, Erdogmus, still leads the junior list despite a very rare setback.

FIDE Classical Ratings Top 25 Juniors | November 2026

There were notable gains for GM Marc'Andria Maurizzi (+17), who took gold on board one in the European Club Cup, GM Vaclav Finek (+22), who took silver, while Woodward (+16) returned to the top 10 with his performance in the U.S. Championship.

The more interesting prodigy stories, however, are a little lower down. 11-year-old IM Roman Shogdzhiev is up to 2484 as he looks to hit the 2500 (plus one last GM norm) he needs to become the youngest grandmaster in history, after strong performances in the Serbian Super League and the European Club Cup.   

He's not without competition, however, as Serbian FM Leonid Ivanovic, one day (!) younger, also starred in the Serbian Super League to gain 87 points and move to 2357. He didn't stop there, however, and in the Serbian Second League he's picked up 124.8 points in 10 rounds.

There's still one round to go, so Ivanovic can overtake Shogdzhiev and potentially smash through the 2500 barrier at the same time, though it seems he's still to score his first grandmaster norm.

If you're wondering where you've heard the name before, it might be because at the age of eight he became the youngest player ever to beat a grandmaster in a game of classical chess. More waves of chess talent are on the way! 

All data courtesy of FIDE.