Ju Wenjun Wins 5th Women's World Chess Championship

GM Ju Wenjun has beaten GM Tan Zhongyi 6.5-2.5 to win the 2025 FIDE Women's World Championship and become only the fourth woman in history to win the title five times. The title holder since 2018 wrapped up the match with three games to spare after making a rock-solid draw in game nine. She takes the €300,000 ($340k) winner's prize, while Tan takes €200,000. 

All of Ju's previous matches had gone to the final game, but this time, despite falling behind in game two, a four-game winning streak blew away her opponent.

The 34-year-old Chinese grandmaster first claimed the crown in 2018 by beating Tan in a match, before defending the title in a 64-player knockout later that year. Then she went on to win matches against GMs Aleksandra Goryachkina (2020) and Lei Tingjie (2023), and her already seven-year reign will now extend at least until the next match in 2026-7.    

Women's World Champions

With Ju's latest victory she's now joined Vera Menchik, Nona Gaprindashvili, and Maia Chiburdanidze in the rarefied ranks of players to have won the title five times or more.

Read more: All The Women's World Chess Champions

The final game saw Tan Zhongyi faced with a mission impossible—she had to win four games in a row simply to force tiebreaks.

Tan Zhongyi's task is simple... and all but impossible — she must win the next 4 games to force tiebreaks!#JuTan pic.twitter.com/4w8AAPnrH6

— chess24 (@chess24com) April 16, 2025

A famous Chinese saying is that "A journey of a thousand miles begins with a single step," but Ju had no interest in allowing that step, with Tan acknowledging her opponent "played very well."

GM Rafael Leitao has analyzed game nine of the match below.

The players are an inspiration to the upcoming generations of Chinese players, so it was fitting some kids got to make the ceremonial opening moves for the last game of the match. 

😍 So cute! Young chess fans made the first ceremonial moves in Game 9 at the FIDE Women’s World Championship Match! #JuTan #WomenInChess pic.twitter.com/TjU03OKtIS

— International Chess Federation (@FIDE_chess) April 16, 2025

For the fifth game in a row, Ju opened 1.e4, and for a fifth time, Tan responded with 1...c5, the Sicilian. Asked about that lack of variety in the press conference, she explained:

I feel my opening knowledge is still quite broad. I feel the games weren’t because of the opening problems, therefore I did not change my opening choice.

As always in the match, we got an early deviation, with 5.Re1 Nd4 new moves for the players. 

In fact we soon got a lively-looking position, although one that favored Ju.

The current position in Ju-Tan is rare, but was seen yesterday in the Late Titled Tuesday, where Bacrot beat Lazavik! https://t.co/5Y7sBiNGWQ#JuTan pic.twitter.com/AYNmgmk6qd

— chess24 (@chess24com) April 16, 2025

The Titled Tuesday game less than 12 hours earlier had been wild, but the women's world champion had no interest in complications and went for 17.Qb3, giving up the d4-pawn and all White's advantage in exchange for a position Ju had correctly judged was a draw. 

Even if Tan had wanted to rage against the dying of the light there was little she could do. It would have been sad to overpress and collapse again for a fifth loss in a row, so instead she played carefully and the game raced to its logical conclusion. Ju had won her fifth world championship title!

Tan Zhongyi accepts a draw and Ju Wenjun becomes only the 4th woman in history to win the Women's World Chess Championship 5 times! 🏆🏆🏆🏆🏆#JuTan pic.twitter.com/33jUwEgtOu

— chess24 (@chess24com) April 16, 2025

Although the score was dominant, she recalled that it hadn't started off so easily:

In this match initially the beginning wasn’t very smooth for me, but after [...] I caught up on the score, I was playing more and more in the zone. 

I was playing more and more in the zone. 

—Ju Wenjun

After briefly falling behind Tan on the live rating list after game two, Ju ended up as by far the highest-rated active female player on 2580.1 (four-time Women's World Champion Hou Yifan is largely retired,) while Tan dropped down to fifth place.

Ju felt her opponent had been unable to show her best chess:

I feel she underperformed. I wasn’t sure, but maybe the stress after game five got to her, so she definitely is better than what she did in this match. 

Tan saw work to be done:

I think in this championship match I exposed some of my weaknesses and afterward in my training I will continue to try to fix them if I want to continue in this professional chess player journey.

When asked about her favorite game, Tan, perhaps surprisingly, named game seven, a rollercoaster clash in which she had real chances of winning with Black in the first game in Chongqing. She felt that was the turning point.

I created a lot of opportunities, so there were some exciting variations, but I missed it and I lost. After that game I felt it was a little bit hopeless to save the match situation. 

A win there would have repeated the scenario from 2018, when Tan won the first game in her home city to reduce the deficit to a single point. Instead the gap grew to three points, with Ju then naming the next game, her fourth win in a row, as her own favorite.

Both players credited their seconds, with Ju mentioning GMs Ni Hua and Maxim Matlakov as doing the main chess work. Tan's team included GM Jeffery Xiong and his father Wayne, with Tan saying that having their support "really decreased my sadness of losing this match."

Both players are planning a break but also to be active in the coming months. After Tan plays the final Women's Grand Prix in Austria (May 5-16) she'll play the TePe Sigeman Tournament (May 20-26) in Malmo, Sweden, where she'll face the likes of GMs Vidit Gujrathi, Richard Rapport, and Yagiz Kaan Erdogmus. Ju mentioned a match in China, while she'll also now be one of two five-time world champions playing in Norway Chess (May 26-June 6).  

The 2025 FIDE Women's World Championship was the most important women's over-the-board event of the year. The defending women's world champion, GM Ju Wenjun, faced off against the challenger, GM Tan Zhongyi, to see who would be crowned world champion. The championship started on April 3 in Shanghai and boasted a €500,000 ($540k) prize fund.

Previous Coverage

• • Game 8: Ju Wenjun Scores 4th Straight Win, Draw Away From Retaining Title
  • Game 7: Ju Wenjun Closes In On Title As Tan Zhongyi Collapses
  • Game 6: Ju Wenjun Powers Into 2-Point Lead
  • Game 5: Ju Wenjun Wins Game 5 To Take World Championship Lead
  • Game 4: Ju Wenjun Survives Heavy Pressure As Game 4 Goes To Bare Kings
  • Game 3: Ju Wenjun Strikes Back To Win Game 3
  • Game 2: Tan Zhongyi Stuns Ju Wenjun To Win Game 2
  • Game 1: Tan Holds Ju To Draw As Women's World Championship Starts In Shanghai
  • Can Ju Wenjun Win 5th World Championship?
  • 2025 FIDE Women's World Championship: All The Information
  • Gukesh Youngest Ever Candidates Winner, Tan Takes Women's By 1.5 Points
  • Ju Wenjun Wins 4th Women's World Championship Title