The Short Answer
Quick answer: FIDE's October 2026 rating list holds 1,904 chess grandmasters. Only 1,332 of them are active, which means they played a rated game in the past year. That's about one grandmaster for every 300 rated players. Russia has the most titles, while India ties Russia for the most active grandmasters.
I counted the titles in FIDE's October 2026 standard rating list on 30 October 2026.
Below are the counts by country, rating, age and gender, and how fast the number grows.
What I Checked
Wikipedia gives a round figure of about 2,000. I went to the source instead.
- FIDE's standard rating list for October 2026, with 569,649 rated players.
- The lists from October 2016, October 2021 and October 2025, to measure growth.
- FIDE's rating rules, for what "inactive" means.
- Wikipedia's page on the title, for its history.
- Chess.com's news report on the newest young grandmaster.
Anyone can repeat the count. The FIDE download page offers every monthly list as a free file. Each row carries a player's name, federation, title, rating, birth year and an activity flag, and I counted those rows with a short script that you could write in an afternoon.
1,904 Titles, 1,332 Active
The list marks each player as active or inactive. Of the 1,904 grandmasters, 1,332 are active and 572 aren't.
FIDE's rating regulations set the rule: "A player is considered to commence inactivity if they play no rated games in a one-year period." One rated game makes the player active again.
So an inactive grandmaster still holds the title. They just haven't played a rated game for a year. Garry Kasparov, rated 2812, is one of them.
That's why counts differ from site to site. One source counts every title holder. Another counts only the players who still compete. Both numbers are correct, as long as the page says which one it uses.
Grandmasters by Country
Grandmasters come from 93 of the 208 federations on the list. Russia leads by a clear margin.
- Russia: 184
- United States: 115
- Germany: 103
- India: 97
- Ukraine: 85
- Spain and France: 60 each
- Serbia: 58
- China: 57
- Poland: 56
Count active players only and the order changes. India and Russia tie with 76 active grandmasters each. Germany has 75, and the United States has 73.
Another 38 grandmasters play under the FIDE flag instead of a national one. Of those, 34 are active.
India Gained the Most
India grew faster than any other country this year. It had 87 grandmasters in October 2025 and has 97 now.
Of the 53 new grandmasters in the past year, 10 play for India. The FIDE flag added 5, China 4 and the United States 3.
The trend runs longer than a year. Since October 2016, 454 players joined the grandmaster list. India's flag holds 53 of them, the most of any country. The United States holds 29.
India's grandmasters are young, too. Nineteen of its 97 were born in 2005 or later. Russia's total holds more inactive players. Of its 184 grandmasters, 108 are inactive, against 21 of India's 97.
How Fast the List Grows
The number climbs every year, but slowly.
- 2016: 1,538 grandmasters
- 2021: 1,738
- 2025: 1,864
- 2026: 1,904
Each count comes from that year's October list.
That's 366 more in ten years, a rise of about 24%.
The pool of rated players grew much faster, from 256,868 in October 2016 to 569,649 on today's list, so it more than doubled while the grandmaster count rose by about a quarter.
So the title is getting rarer as a share of all rated players. In 2016, about 0.6% of rated players held it. Today it's 0.33%. More people play rated chess than ever, but the bar for the title hasn't moved.
Most Grandmasters Rate Below 2500
Here's the surprise. The median grandmaster is rated 2481, below the 2500 the title asks for.
That rule needs 2500 at some point in a career, not forever. On the list, the title stays when the rating falls.
- 1,109 grandmasters, or 58%, sit below 2500 today.
- 412 sit below 2400.
- The lowest rated grandmaster on the list has 2025.
- The median among active grandmasters is 2478.
So a rating alone won't tell you who holds the title. A 2450 player can be a grandmaster, and a 2550 player might not be one yet. For how a rating rises and falls after each game, see our Elo system guide.
The 2700 Club
At the top, the title gets rare fast. Only 36 grandmasters are rated 2700 or more, and 33 of them are active.
- Magnus Carlsen, Norway: 2823
- Garry Kasparov, Russia: 2812, inactive
- Hikaru Nakamura, United States: 2792
Kasparov's rating doesn't move, because he hasn't played a rated game in the past year, so the list keeps his last rating and marks him inactive, as it does for any player who stops.
Below that group, 197 grandmasters sit at 2600 or more, and 150 of those are active. That's about one grandmaster in ten.
Our July 2026 ratings report covers how the very top of the list moved earlier this year.
Women Grandmasters
There are 44 women with the full grandmaster title, and 33 of them are active. That's about 2.3% of all grandmasters.
The highest rated is Judit Polgar at 2675, though she's inactive. Among active players, Hou Yifan leads at 2596. Susan Polgar, also inactive, has 2577.
By federation, China has 8 women grandmasters and Georgia has 5. India, Russia and Ukraine have 4 each.
Don't confuse this with Woman Grandmaster, or WGM. That's a separate title, and 540 players hold it. Of the 44 women with the full title, 38 also hold the WGM title.
The count grows slowly. It was 33 in October 2016, 39 in 2021 and 44 in 2025, the same as today.
The Youngest Grandmasters
The youngest name on the list was born in 2013. That's Faustino Oro of Argentina, rated 2560.
Chess.com reported that Oro completed the requirements at 12 years, 6 months and 26 days, in Sardinia in May 2026. FIDE's Council approved his title on 23 August 2026. That made him the second youngest grandmaster ever.
The record still belongs to Abhimanyu Mishra of the United States. He qualified at 12 years, 4 months and 25 days, in 2021. He's rated 2636 today.
Eleven grandmasters on the list were born in 2010 or later. They include Yagiz Kaan Erdogmus of Turkey, born in 2011 and rated 2731, and Andy Woodward of the United States, born in 2010. Another 22 were born in 2008 or 2009.
The Oldest Names, and the Names That Leave
The oldest grandmaster on the list was born in 1932. Ten were born before 1940.
The median birth year is 1983. So the typical grandmaster is in their forties, not their twenties.
Names also leave the list. Between October 2025 and October 2026, 53 grandmasters joined it and 13 dropped off. The list doesn't say why a name goes, so I won't guess.
That churn is why last year's count is already out of date. FIDE publishes a new list every month, and new titles appear as FIDE approves them. If you quote a number, quote the month with it.
GM vs Other Titles
Grandmaster is the highest of four open titles. Here's how many players hold each one.
- Grandmaster (GM): 1,904
- International Master (IM): 4,318
- FIDE Master (FM): 9,866
- Candidate Master (CM): 3,921
FIDE also has four titles for women only. The list shows 540 WGMs, 983 WIMs, 2,266 WFMs and 1,381 WCMs.
Grandmasters make up 0.33% of all rated players, about one in 300. Among the 221,403 active players, the share is 0.6%.
There are more than twice as many International Masters as grandmasters. Many strong players hold the IM title without the GM title.
How the Title Is Earned
FIDE first awarded the title in 1950, to 27 players, according to Wikipedia's page on the title.
Today a player needs two things. First, they need three norms, which are very strong results in tournaments against other titled players. Second, they need a rating of 2500 at any point.
The order doesn't matter. Some players pass 2500 first and chase the norms later. Others collect the norms before their rating catches up.
Our guide to chess titles and norms explains the norm rules step by step. It covers the IM and FM titles too.
What the Numbers Mean for You
These numbers put the title in scale. A grandmaster is one of about 1,900 people, out of more than half a million rated players.
Online ratings don't map neatly onto FIDE's. Our FIDE vs Chess.com rating guide compares the two scales, so you can see how far a given online rating sits from 2500.
If you're working toward a first FIDE rating, note the floor. FIDE's rules say players whose ratings drop below 1400 show as unrated on the next list. Between rated events, you can practice against our chess bot.
And if you want to know whether a player you watch is a grandmaster, search their name on FIDE's ratings site. The title shows next to the name, with the federation and the current rating.