Freestyle Chess takes centre-stage in quick time, gives FIDE plenty of reasons to ponder over future

With some of the world’s best players in action, Freestyle Chess has been dominating the conversation so far in 2025, having successfully conducted events in Weissenhaus and in Paris in a span of four months with the Grenke Chess Freestyle Open currently underway.

“Yeah, I do think it’s definitely the future of the sport. Not the immediate near future but for the next-to-next generation, or maybe a century later, at some point in the future. But probably it won’t happen in the next 10 years.”

In an
exclusive interaction with Firstpost a little over a month before he made an impressive debut in the Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour in Paris, Arjun Erigaisi stated that he did not expect the Fischer Random format to surpass Classical chess anytime in the near future. The Indian Grandmaster’s comment was in contrast with what world No 1 Magnus Carlsen and Freestyle Chess co-founder Jan Henric Buettner have been claiming in recent months.

Carlsen has gone to the extent of
publicly expressing his dislike for the Classical format – which led to the Norwegian chess star voluntarily vacating his World Championship in 2022 instead of defending in order to become a six-time world champion.

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