Antonio Radic Agadmator

Antonio Radic (better known as Agadmator) is a Croatian chess expert, content creator, and chess celebrity. He runs the biggest YouTube chess channel on YouTube with over a million subscribers as of March 2021.

• Chess Career
• YouTube Channel
• Podcast And Manga

Chess Career

Agadmator started playing chess when he was five years old. His grandfather, FIDE master Anto Krnjic, taught him the rules. He stopped playing at age seven and only took up chess again after turning 17.

Although not an avid international tournament player, Radic has won multiple titles in his home town of Krizevci. He reached his peak FIDE rating of 2010 in September 2010 and earned the Croatian "majstorski kandidat" (candidate master) title in 2019. Radic currently has a national rating of 2115 (January 2021).

In the following game from the 2018 Križevci Chess Club Championship, Agadmator played Black against Domagoj Frtalic. Using his knowledge from a game by GM Bobby Fischer that Agadmator had previously analyzed on his YouTube channel, he quickly equalized the position in the opening. He slowly built an advantage and eventually won the game after finding a forced mating sequence.

Here's the analysis of that game by Agadmator himself:

YouTube Channel

Radic started dedicating his YouTube channel exclusively to chess in 2016. Back then, he worked as a graphic designer and decided to create chess videos after work to share his passion with the world. A year later when he reached 25,000 followers, he quit his regular job to fully dedicate himself to his channel.

Today Agadmator has YouTube's biggest chess channel in the world. He has over a million subscribers and over 400 million views (March 2021). His videos are mainly short analyses of classical or current games played by masters.

Behold, the Golden Play button 😎
Thanks @YouTube pic.twitter.com/GqUSXuQfRF

— agadmator (@agadmator) March 4, 2021

Part of Agadmator's success is his honest and humble approach to video-making—he doesn't try to conceal his mistakes and is open about every decision he makes. His consistency and ability to quickly put together great videos have also caught the chess world's attention. Radic's readiness to upload videos right after important games have even caught GM Anish Giri's attention:

Investigation is needed, but I have a strong suspicion that @agadmator has uploaded this game even before it has been played. pic.twitter.com/6rphKlS8RK

— Anish Giri (@anishgiri) January 3, 2021

His most popular video goes over the classical game between IM Rashid Nezhmetdinov and GM Oleg Chernikov in 1962. Nezhmetdinov sacrificed his queen on the 12th move and won the game, creating a true masterpiece.

Podcast And Manga

Besides running his YouTube channel, Radic also started two new projects in 2020. In March, he released his first podcast episode that interviewed GM Maxime Vachier-Lagrave. He also talked to the bullet legend and streaming giant GM Hikaru Nakamura in the second episode of his podcast:

In September 2020, Radic published the first chapter of the Age of Caissa manga. According to the Croatian YouTuber, the manga is an attempt to attract more people to chess by making it a part of a larger and exciting story. You can read the first chapter of the manga for free here.