Who Is The Greatest Chess Player Ever

, and the Modern Greatest is Wesley So.

One and two are Magnus Carlsen and Gary Kasparov, though which way around to place them I'm not sure.

However, I think this is an impossible question to answer logically unless you have a very clear and explicit way of stating what criteria you are using to define what would make a player the greatest player in the first place.  When you have that in mind, the answer normally becomes quite obvious.  If greatest means something to one person, such as longest tenure as World's Champion, and something different to somebody else, such as the player with the largest number of celebrated games, communications must become confused.

One obvious point to make right away is that as the world's population expands over time, becoming the world's champion tends to become a much more difficult and impressive feat and being number one necessarily means having to beat more great players to get there.  Thus there is some kind of argument for thinking that the progression of time itself is a major factor in producing chess players now who are better than ever before.

If we are talking the player with the highest Elo/Fide ranking, then it would be folly to describe anyone besides Magnus Carlsen as being the best.

If we are talking about the player whose games were thought by many as most amazing, we might choose Adolf Anderssen.

And if winning major tournaments was our criteria, we might pick Anatoly Karpov.

If we mean who had the most natural talent, could it be Capablanca?

If we are talking the player with the highest proportion of wins as against draws and/or losses, then we must admit that Paul Morphy was the best.

If we are talking the player who lost the fewest games as a proportion of all those that he played, then it should be Jose Raul Capablanca.

The player who held the World Champion's title for the longest period of time, another obvious criterion for greatness, was Emanuel Lasker.  He is a favourite player of mine, I don't know why anyone would take issue with his inoffensive, generic and basically sound playing style.  Wilhelm Steinitz also held the World Championship title for many years, particularly when you consider his official and unofficial World Championship periods.

And Alexander Alekhine had one of the very highest percentages of games won in proportion to losses or draws in his total number of games, and his opponents seem to have been much stronger overall than those faced by Paul Morphy.

And some people won't hear but that it was Gary Kasparov or Bobby Fischer, both of whom were undeniably great by virtually any standard, and both of whom were probably better, objectively speaking, than any other chess champion who came before them.

If you like defensive chess, it might be Tigran Petrosian.  If you like attacking chess, it might be Mikhail Tal.  If you like chess played in the grand Romantic style of yore, perhaps you would think that Mikhail Chigorin was best.

And then there is always the tendency to adopt a preference for whoever was playing at the highest levels at the time when you were taking notice of chess.

Personally, in view of the fact that Magnus Carlsen has had the highest ever FIDE ranking as worked out scientifically by them, I think it might be wise just to accept that he is the best player of all time.  The more I think about it, the more it makes sense to me.  We have FIDE rankings for all the great players from Mikhail Botvinnik up to the present day, and I think it's an authoritative source. 

This web source is quite helpful:

https://www.olimpbase.org/Elo/Elo197307e.html

What is more difficult is figuring out who was the better player between Alexander Alekhine and Mikhail Botvinnik.  We do know that of their three known games, Botvinnik won one and two were drawn.

Although who can really say?  Isn't it nice just to have one's own favourite(s)?  Aren't all chess players great in their own way.  I think there are some great ones on Chess.com.  Why obssess about absolute chess standards when there are so many players still to beat on one's own?

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I THINK FICSHER