Is chess easier than math?

Both = hard.  In fact, pretty much anything at a high level is hard.

IMHO, the hard part about math isn't learning it (i.e. taking the classes and getting a good grade), but more on its application to problems that we face everyday.  I think this point was missed in the replies.

The advantage (most) have with math over chess is we're given systematic instruction starting from a very young age.

So by the time you're trying to earn e.g. a 4 year degree... it only takes 4 years but you've been building up to it for over a decade by that point.

Imagine having chess class from age 5 or 6, every year, for 10+ years. By the time you're ready to "get good" at it, you'd probably already be a master

OP, I, as probably did you, spent 11 years as a child studying maths approx three hours a week, then did another two years at 5 hours per week to get A levels, then spent three years at university approx 30 hours per week to get my maths degree. All under the tutelage of professional mathematicians.

Spend that amount of time studying chess with the same level of mentoring along the way and I think you'll most likely get good at it.

A large part of math activity has nothing to do with application to problems that we face everyday, and is seen by many as very hard indeed.

I imagine the numbers back you up, but all that means is that NM is further up the chess bell-curve that B Sc is up the math bell-curve, and so on.

I suspect that it is exactly as hard to be one of the top 0.0001% of mathematicians in the world as it is to be one of the top 0.0001% of chess-players. Being a GM isn't like being a PhD, it's like being a lecturer at a top university. Being Carlsen isn't like being a math professor, it's like being Stephen Hawking or one of his peers.

Doesn't that depend on how one decides who counts as a mathematician and who counts as a chess-player? ... and how one measures "hard"?

     Lets compare top performers in each what G.M. would we compare to Isaac Newton...Bobby Fischer ?thaat makes comparing the two kinda hard.

There is generally one answer in math, but generally numerous answers in chess.

I agree obtaining a degree and PhD in Math is easier in 3rd world universities than 1st world universities. I dont know if that applies to chess comparing Russia with India.

Mathematics is the greatest and the most beautiful tool for reasoning. Why mathematics helps in understanding laws of universe is one of the wonders.  Chess cannot be compared with Mathematics. Both are different. Mathematicians have taught the world how to reason and to generalize forever and not only stop at ‘blind intuition’. If Mathematicians were not there, then people would only stop at intuition, and we would see engineering designs not accurate and would collapse at any moment. Although pure Mathematicians do not create the most beautiful equations in the world so that space ships could fly on their theories. For most of us Maths means equations. This is the biggest problem. In schools/colleges they do not teach Mathematical thought (no one has time and energy), but just a series of steps and practicing the patterns for exam, and to help students to pass exams with flying colors. The most powerful and the most beautiful thought has already been completed by the mathematician and students have to just practice these steps (that also requires talent/hard work, practicing the patterns etc., but it has nothing to do with mathematical thought in general). Thinking the problem in terms of abstract mathematical model is very hard (also it depends on how much passionate you are and is a boost). Things are changing now. Maths is more fun/recreational now (not only because of chess in education). Basically Chess thought and true Mathematical thought are opposite poles. In chess(as a sport) you calculate but there is some judgment in the end (this is the skill of that player-pattern recognition/memory/experience-Sport!).  Mathematicians  also start with extraordinary intuition, but a mathematician strives for proof-extra step missing in chess, and not needed in chess as a sport(although chess end -games are a generalization in some areas, but still not close to pure mathematics).  Intuition is needed in any field. If you show 8 Queens Problem to a good chess player (I know playing chess and solving fabricated chess problems is a different thing), he/she may do it quickly. But does the solver understand the hidden abstract math model behind it? And it is not even needed. But a mathematician will not be interested in just solving it, and they are interested in finding the eternal truth and hence the Mathematical theory of why 8 queens fit like that. The goals are different.  Why is Alpha-zero superior to humans in chess? All the AI in that has those very-very complex mathematical theories and research for many years. And computer science teaches how to solve problems in the most optimal way (again a flavor of mathematicians). Humans cannot think in the most optimal way to solve a problem, and so they have to rely on their intuition which works in chess as a sport for example (and in life). Another example is about quantum mechanics, which is generally accepted as the ‘greatest intellectual achievement of 20th century’. It is not just, the most beautiful intuition of humans (counter-intuition rather, quantum eraser experiment for example). The math is the base to explain it. Albert Einstein did not say just by his extraordinary and a very rare intuition that ‘Gravity slows down time’ (one of the implications of General relativity). He had his General relativity equations even before the solar eclipse experiment took place (and they concluded that his theory was correct). Chess is a subset of some mathematical model (we do not know the model yet). Chess as a sport does not require abstract thinking like Maths. One cannot help other to improve and goals are different. It ultimately depends how much interest/passion you have in a field.

Chess is harder than maths for me.