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The title International Grandmaster is awarded to world-class chess masters by the world chess organization FIDE. Apart from "World Champion", Grandmaster is the highest title a chess player can attain.

It is a lifetime title, in chess literature usually abbreviated as GM or IGM (this is in contrast to FM for FIDE Master and IM for International Master).

GM, IM, and FM are open to both men and women. A separate gender-segregated title, WGM for Woman Grandmaster, is also available, but is something of a misnomer. It is awarded for a level of skill between that of a FIDE Master and an International Master. In 1991 Susan Polgar became the first woman to earn the GM title under the same conditions as the men, and these days most of the top 10 women hold the GM title.

The requirements for becoming a Grandmaster are somewhat complex. A player must have an ELO chess rating of at least 2500 at one time (although they need not maintain this level to keep the title). A rating of 2400 or higher is required to become an International Master. In addition, three favorable results (called norms) in tournaments involving other Grandmasters, including some from countries other than the applicant's, are usually required before FIDE will confer the title on a player. There are other milestones a player can achieve to get the title, such as winning the World Junior Championship. Current regulations may be found in the FIDE Handbook.

International Grandmaster titles are also awarded to correspondence chess players by the International Correspondence Chess Federation, and composers and solvers of chess problems.

Contents 1 Origin and Current Statistics 2 "Super-grandmaster" 3 Title Inflation

Origin and Current Statistics

The title "Grandmaster" was first formally conferred by Russian Tsar Nicholas II, who in 1914 awarded it to five players (Lasker, Capablanca, Alekhine, Tarrasch and Marshall), who were finalists of a tournament in Saint Petersburg which he had partially funded. The tournament was won by Lasker ahead of Capablanca.

FIDE first awarded the International Grandmaster title in 1950 to 27 players. These players were Bernstein, Boleslavsky, Bondarevsky, Botvinnik, Bronstein, Duras, Euwe, Fine, Flohr, Grünfeld, Keres, Kostić, Kotov, Levenfish, Lilienthal, Maroczy, Mieses, Najdorf, Ragozin, Reshevsky, Rubinstein, Sämisch, Smyslov, Stahlberg, Szabó, Tartakower, and Vidmar.

In 1972 there were only 88 GM's with 33 being Russian. In July 2005, the FIDE ratings list included over 900 grandmasters; see list of chess players and category chess grandmasters for some of them. The increase is at least partly due to the greater ease of travel, which makes it simpler to organize the international tournaments required to provide norm opportunities.

The Grandmaster title retains its prestige because it represents a very high level of chess performance against other titled players. A chess master is typically in the top 2% of all tournament players. A Grandmaster is typically in the top 0.02% percent at the time he or she earns the title.

"Super-grandmaster"

A player whose ELO rating is over 2700 is sometimes informally called a "super-GM". From 1970 when FIDE first adopted the ELO rating system to January 2006, there have been only 38 players who have achieved a peak rating of 2700 or more. Below is a list compiled by Przemek Jahr. This list however does not account for the inflation of ELO ratings over time, as is evident by the fact that almost all of these peak ratings are from recent years.

Rank	Rating	Player	Date	Country
1.	2851	Garry Kasparov	1999.07	Russia
2.	2809	Vladimir Kramnik	2002.01	Russia
3.	2801	Veselin Topalov	2006.01	Bulgaria
4.	2797	Viswanathan Anand	2001.07	India
5.	2785	Bobby Fischer	1972.04	USA
6.	2780	Anatoly Karpov	1994.07	Russia
7.	2765	Peter Svidler	2006.01	Russia
8.	2763	Péter Lékó	2005.04	Hungary
9.	2758	Alexander Morozevich	1999.07	Russia
10.	2755	Michael Adams	2000.07	England
11.	2752	Vassily Ivanchuk	2005.07	Ukraine
12.	2752	Levon Aronian	2006.01	Armenia
13.	2751	Alexei Shirov	2000.01	Spain
14.	2745	Gata Kamsky	1996.07	USA
15.	2743	Ruslan Ponomariov	2002.04	Ukraine
16.	2739	Evgeny Bareev	2003.10	Russia
17.	2735	Judit Polgar	2005.07	Hungary
18.	2732	Alexander Grischuk	2003.07	Russia
19.	2731	Etienne Bacrot	2005.04	France
20.	2724	Boris Gelfand	2005.07	Russia
21.	2715	Valery Salov	1995.01	Russia
22.	2714	Loek van Wely	2001.10	The Netherlands
23.	2712	Nigel Short	2004.04	England
24.	2710	Alexander Beliavsky	1997.07	Slovenia
25.	2709	Shakhriyar Mamedyarov	2006.01	Azerbaijan
26.	2707	Vladimir Akopian	2005.10	Armenia
27.	2707	Liviu-Dieter Nisipeanu	2005.10	Romania
28.	2706	Rustam Kasimdzhanov	2001.10	Uzbekistan
29.	2706	Ivan Sokolov	2004.01	The Netherlands
30.	2705	Mikhail Tal	1980.01	Latvia
31.	2705	Alexey Dreev	2003.10	Russia
32.	2704	Teimour Radjabov	2006.01	Azerbaijan
33.	2702	Michal Krasenkow	2000.07	Poland
34.	2702	Ilia Smirin	2001.07	Israel
35.	2702	Alexander Khalifman	2001.10	Russia
36.	2702	Zurab Azmaiparashvili	2003.07	Georgia
37.	2700	Vladimir Malakhov	2004.01	Russia
38.	2700	Viktor Bologan	2005.04	Moldova

Title Inflation

Some people have argued that the players currently awarded the title of Grandmaster are not as dominant as those five original Grandmasters were in their day. Lasker, Capablanca and Alekhine were all World Champions, and both Tarrasch and Marshall were strong enough to play world title matches (both losing against Lasker). Tarrasch was regarded as the strongest player in the world in the period between the decline of Steinitz and the rise of Lasker.

This argument says that the title of Grandmaster ought to be reserved for those who, at some time in their lives, become serious contenders for the World Championship, or who have actually held that title. Otherwise, a "super-GM" designation becomes necessary in order to refer to that group, leading to an accumulation of superlatives.