World No 1 and reigning Freestyle Chess Grand Slam Tour champions Magnus Carlsen sailed into the final of the inaugural Freestyle Chess World Championship, where he faces world No 3 Fabiano Caruana, after beating Nodirbek Abdusattorov 3-1 in the semi-finals on Saturday. Caruana defeated German Grandmaster Vincent Keymer 2.5-1.5 in the other semi-final showdown to confirm a dream final with the Norwegian at the Weissenhaus Private Nature Luxury Resort in Wangels, Germany.

Carlsen stamps his authority over Nodirbek

Carlsen had picked Nodirbek as his semi-final opponent after topping the round-robin standings despite suffering a
stunning defeat at the hands of Arjun Erigaisi. The semi-final showdown began with consecutive draws, the two players choosing to shake hands on level terms in both games with Carlsen holding fort despite facing serious time pressure in Game 2.

Carlsen surged ahead in Game 3 while playing as white, beating Nodirbek in 48 moves. Both players were in the mood to attack in this round, with both sets of bishops and knights getting knocked off the board by the 26th move. The Uzbekistani GM, however, committed a blunder (33. Re2) while pushing for a win, allowing his celebrated opponent to seize control and grind him into submission.

Nodirbek needed to win Game 4 in order to level the scores and force the semi-final showdown to head into tie-breaks. Carlsen, however, maintained a stable position on the board despite committing a couple of errors (19. h4 and 24. Nc5) and won in just 29 moves after cornering the white king with a knight, a rook and his queen to complete a 3-1 triumph.

Nodirbek had a considerable time advantage over his fancied opponent – three-and-a-half minutes compared to less than half-a-minute for Carlsen. The 35-year-old, however, reiterated the fact that it will take more than just time pressure to beat the best in the world.

Caruana vs Keymer showdown goes into decider

As for the other semi-final, Caruana had drawn first blood while playing as black and maintained a lead over his opponent with a draw in the second game. Keymer, however, made things interesting by leveling the scores in Game 3 to setup a decider in the fourth and final rapid game.

The first three games were hard-fought encounters.  Caruana defeated Keymer in 72 moves in Game 1, while the latter returned the favour in 68 moves in Game 3. Caruana, however, sealed a 2.5-1.5 victory in dominant fashion after winning game four in just 22 moves while playing as black, with nearly seven minutes left on the clock compared to just 20 seconds for his opponent.

🇳🇴 Magnus Carlsen vs 🇺🇸 Fabiano Caruana in the final!#FreestyleChess pic.twitter.com/uuAQi8MnZS

— International Chess Federation (@FIDE_chess) February 14, 2026

The final between Carlsen and Caruana gets underway on Sunday, 15 February, with Game 4 and the Armageddon tie-break taking place on Monday, if necessary. The winner will pocket a prize money of $100,000 while the runner-up takes home $60,000.

Indian No 1 Arjun, who had finished sixth out of eight players in the round-robin stage, defeated Javokhir Sindarov 3-1 and will be facing American GM Hans Niemann for the fifth place starting Sunday.

Arjun Erigaisi failed to reach the semi-finals of the FIDE Freestyle Chess World Championship in Weissenhaus on Friday, but still had a memorable classification round with a victory over world No 1 Magnus Carlsen. The Indian chess prodigy also defeated Vincent Keymer and FIDE World Cup winner Javokhir Sindarov.

The 22-year-old from Warangal, Erigaisi, lost the remaining four games to finish in sixth place in the classification as Carlsen, Keymer, Fabiano Caruana and Nodirbek Abdusattorov progressed to the semi-finals.

Erigaisi, fast becoming Carlsen’s ‘boogeyman’

Amazingly, Carlsen’s only defeat in the classification round came against the Indian Erigaisi before he won the round robin with 4.5 points out of 7.

The match was played in the No 277 position, where the two bishops are in the extreme corner on the king’s side. Making the most of the white pieces’ advantage, Erigaisi pushed Carlsen into a corner early on

“This is a position that you don’t even want to get in your nightmares,” legendary Judit Polgar said in commentary as Erigiasi took an advantage over Carlsen. “These are the positions that you want to make a good move and then resign because you don’t want to suffer longer.”

Chess great Peter Leko added, “You won’t even wish it upon your biggest enemy. This is a horror.”

Erigaisi’s advantage in the early opening can be explained by the fact that he did not play a piece from the back rank till the 10th move,

“I find it interesting that Arjun has not moved any other piece other than his pawns. It’s like a pawn war,” Polgar underlined.

As per the Lichess engine, Carlsen also made four inaccurate moves during the game, and a major mistake on the 27th move before resigning next.

How Arjun crushed Carlsen

It must have been a difficult defeat for Carlsen to digest, having recently lost to Erigiasi at the FIDE World Blitz Championship 2025 towards the end of last year. Carlsen had infamously
slammed the table in frustration after losing to Arjun, and while at Weissenhaus, he repeated any such antics; it’s clear that Erigiasi is soon becoming Carlsen’s boogeyman.

The FIDE Freestyle Chess World Championship 2026 will be held from February 13 to 15 at the Weissenhaus Private Nature Luxury Resort in Wangels, Germany. For the first time, the event is being jointly organised by FIDE and Freestyle Chess, marking a big shift from the tension seen between the two sides just a year ago.

This is also the first time the tournament is officially called the ‘FIDE Freestyle Chess World Championship’, even though FIDE had earlier organised world title events in the same format in 2019 and 2022 under the name Fischer Random World Championship.

How the structure has changed from 2025

In 2025, Freestyle Chess was run as a year-long Grand Slam Tour with multiple legs across the world. However, there is no full Freestyle Tour this year. Instead, the world championship is now a standalone three-day event with rapid time controls and a reduced prize fund.

The qualification system has also changed this year. In 2026, six players qualified through the 2025 Freestyle Grand Slam Tour, wne wildcard was nominated, and one player came through an online play-in open to titled players. The final event features eight players in total.

Tournament format in 2026

• February 13: Single round-robin group stage (7 rounds) with a 10+5 time control.

• February 14: Semifinals (best-of-four matches, 25+10 time control).

• February 15: Final (best-of-four match, 25+10 time control).

Only the top four players from the group stage advance to the knockout stage. The total prize pool is $300,000 (Rs 2.7 crore), with $100,000 (Rs 90 lakh) going to the champion.

Who are the participants?

The eight players fighting for the title are:

• Magnus Carlsen

• Fabiano Caruana

• Levon Aronian

• Vincent Keymer

• Arjun Erigaisi

• Javokhir Sindarov

• Hans Niemann

• Nodirbek Abdusattorov

India’s
D Gukesh and
R Praggnanandhaa are notable absentees, while Nakamura has decided not to defend his title.

Nakamura, who won the 2022 Fischer Random World Championship, declined to participate this time, citing the rushed arrangement, change in format, and his focus on the Candidates Tournament.

Who are the favourites?

Magnus Carlsen enters as the top-rated player in the world and arguably the biggest favourite. His rapid skills make him very dangerous in a short event like this. Fabiano Caruana is another strong contender. Nodirbek Abdusattorov and Javokhir Sindarov are also among the favourites.

For Indian fans, Arjun Erigaisi will be the one to watch out. He has already shown good form in the World Rapid & Blitz Championships 2025 late last year, winning bronze medals in both events.