Judit Polgár

Verified Timeline

Lore & Background

Polgár was born on 23 July 1976 in Budapest to a Jewish-Hungarian family. She and her two older sisters, Grandmaster Susan and International Master Sofia, were part of an educational experiment carried out by their father, László Polgár, to prove that children could make exceptional achievements if trained in a specialist subject from a very early age. 'Geniuses are made, not born,' was László's thesis. He and his wife Klára educated their three daughters at home, with chess as the specialist subject. Traditionally, chess had been male-dominated, but from the beginning, László was against the idea that his daughters had to participate in female-only events, putting the Polgárs in conflict with the Hungarian Chess Federation. Polgár was a chess prodigy. At age 5, she defeated a family friend without looking at the board. After the game, the friend joked: 'You are good at chess, but I'm a good cook.' Judit replied: 'Do you cook without looking at the stove?' She first defeated an International Master, Dolfi Drimer, at age 10 and a grandmaster, Lev Gutman, at age 11. At age 12, she became the youngest player to break into the FIDE top-100 rating list, ranked 55 in the January 1989 list. In 1991, she became the youngest player at the time to achieve the title of Grandmaster, at age 15 years and 4 months, breaking the 33-year-old record held by former world champion Bobby Fischer. She rarely played in women-only tournaments and never competed for the Women's World Championship, stating: 'I always say that women should have the self-confidence that they are as good as male players, but only if they are willing to work and take it seriously as much as male players.'

Reader's Guide

Judit Polgár's significance lies in her unprecedented achievements as a female chess player in a historically male-dominated field. She was the top-rated woman in the world from January 1989 until her retirement in 2014, remaining No. 1 until the March 2015 rating list—a record of 26 consecutive years. She is the only woman to have won a game against a reigning world number one player (Garry Kasparov, in 2002) and defeated eleven current or former world champions in either rapid or classical chess: Magnus Carlsen, Anatoly Karpov, Kasparov, Vladimir Kramnik, Boris Spassky, Vasily Smyslov, Veselin Topalov, Viswanathan Anand, Ruslan Ponomariov, Alexander Khalifman, and Rustam Kasimdzhanov. She won or shared first in the chess tournaments of Hastings 1993, Madrid 1994, León 1996, U.S. Open 1998, Hoogeveen 1999, Sigeman & Co 2000, Japfa 2000, and the Najdorf Memorial 2000. After retiring from competitive chess in August 2014, she was elected captain and head coach of the Hungarian national men's team in June 2015. She received Hungary's highest decoration, the Grand Cross of the Order of Saint Stephen of Hungary, in August 2015. In 2021, she was inducted into the World Chess Hall of Fame, and in September 2024, as part of FIDE's centennial celebration, she was awarded the FIDE 100 Award as the best female player of the past 100 years.

Did You Know?

• At age 12, Judit Polgár became the youngest player ever to break into the FIDE top-100 rating list, ranked 55 in January 1989.
• In 1991, she became the youngest Grandmaster at the time, at 15 years and 4 months, breaking Bobby Fischer's 33-year-old record.
• She is the only woman to have won a game against a reigning world number one player, defeating Garry Kasparov in 2002.
• She was the top-rated woman in the world for 26 consecutive years, from January 1989 until the March 2015 rating list.
• In September 2024, FIDE awarded her the FIDE 100 Award as the best female player of the past 100 years.