GM Judit Polgar, the greatest female chess player of all time, scored a 6-0 clean sweep in a simultaneous display as her Global Chess Festival celebrated its 11th edition. The event, staged on September 30 in Budapest, attracted thousands of visitors for events that included playing robots, chessboxing, book signings, and RubikChess, a combination of chess and solving a Rubik’s cube.ย ย
Since Polgar, the only woman ever to reach the world’s top 10, retired from competitive chess in 2014, she’s devoted herself to chess education and spreading chess around the world. Central to that is the Global Chess Festival, with a stated mission for its 11th edition, “to share the beauty of chess with five million people by 2025, to connect and enjoy chess-related activities on the day of the festival.”
The event took place in the spectacular Hungarian National Gallery that towers above the Danube.
Extremely long line of chess enthusiasts waiting to get inside the building for the 2025 Global Chess Festival @ChessConnectsUs @GMJuditPolgar pic.twitter.com/HlTcZ6TKDI
โ Susan Polgar (@SusanPolgar) September 30, 2025
Since the event was held on a weekday there were even more schoolchildren than in some previous years. They were catered for with a chess palace, adventure trails, chess art classes, gallery tours, and even the chance to play, and program, robots.
Judit was joined by her sister and Former Women’s World Champion GM Susan Polgar, with a book signing and some giant chess.
The Community’s Game ๐ pic.twitter.com/7WbkOObAKV
โ Judit Polgar (@GMJuditPolgar) October 2, 2025
There was a chessboxing exhibit (trying to solve puzzles before and after throwing some punches), a game of “invisible chess”…
…and a RubikChess tournament, that combined chess with the Rubik’s cube. Each team of one boy and one girl played a blitz game that was stopped at three random points for the other player to solve a Rubik’s cubeโthe faster they did it the more time they had for the chess game.ย
Thoughts about #RubikChess and #modernlife and #education with Ernล Rubik at yesterday’s 11. Judit Polgar’s Global Chess Festival.๐ https://t.co/czXdgr1uen #ChessConnectsUs #chess @FideWomen @Rubiks_Official @Reuters
โ Judit Polgar (@GMJuditPolgar) October 1, 2025
Judit was joined by the inventor of the cube, 81-year-old Erno Rubik, who commented, “We are slowly forgetting to use our hands,” adding, “our hands and our mind together made us human.”
You can now watch the Aftermovie for this year’s festival.
The highlight of the event was again the Community Chess Simul where Judit took on six teams from around the world.
It was a clock simul, where Judit had 110 minutes on her clock and each team 50 minutes, with a 10-second increment added after each move. The moves were all played on boards in Budapest (check out all the games), but with all the teams except the Hungarian stars consulting online.ย
The first game to finish featured another Hungarian star, IM Anna Rudolf, whose Twitch community suddenly got hit by a killer blow when they went for 14…Qxe6? instead of the strong but hard-to-find 14…Nb6!.
After 15.Bxc4! there was no way back!
By the end Rudolf’s team were down to five seconds on the clock, but the clock wasn’t the issue.
The next team to fall was Chess Is For Everyone, whose team included three blind or visually-impaired players joining from Barcelona.
14.Ndb5!? was a risky sacrifice, but it worked out for Polgar.
Next to drop were the Chessable Improvers, who picked the Petroff and kept things solid, but when Judit got the chance she launched an all-but-unstoppable kingside attack.
Judit’s next victims were the Spanish community, led by IM David Martinez in Budapest.
They were even better before swapping off queens, then had a draw, but in the final seconds things fell apart with one rash pawn push!ย ย
The team to really have Judit on the ropes, however, was the chessboxers led by Matt Thomas. 32…d4! got some high if slightly barbed praise from IM Levy Rozman, who also used the broadcast to make the first move of his record-breaking GothamChess vs. the World game:
Are they listening to us? I refuse to accept that chess boxers have any remaining brain cells. d4 is brilliant. Iโm really worried for Judit now, as a biased spectator.
For Judit, meanwhile, the moment of real horror came after 35…Bh5!: “They played Bh5 and I suddenly see, my God, Iโm going to get checkmated on d3. That was not a nice moment!”
Judit then said she went for the “famous g4,” but this time it was purely a matter of survival. She would have been happy with a draw, but instead got a win as the chessboxers erred with time running out.ย
The last game to finish was between the one all-local team, Hungarian Stars, featuring neuroscientist Szilvester E. Vizi, former boxing world champion Istvan Kovacs, rapper Peter Geszti, writer Peter Gardos, and 10- and 8-year-old kids. It looked like being a very early knockout, with Judit talking to the team and explaining to them that their position was perilous, but 15.Nf5+?! was controversial!ย ย
Judit told Rozman and IM Tania Sachdev afterward:
I had a discussion, and I actually told them, you know, guys, I can go Nf5, and then the writer was telling me, no, you have to play against us as if youโre playing against Kasparov! Are you sure you would go Nf5, sacrificing your knight? And then this was a debate… Eventually I said, ok, I go Nf5, but I said I would go against Garry as well. I just like the game when thereโs a lot of action!ย
You have to play against us as if you’re playing against Kasparov!
โWriter Peter Gardos to Judit Polgar
Technically the move was a mistake and Black should have captured back with the g6-pawn, while even in the game Polgar again went astray and had to work hard. The end was sweet, however.
Rozman wondered “Do you offer a pity draw or try to beat everybody?” before realizing that Judit had completely trapped the black knight. All she had to do was advance her pawns to clinch the sixth and final win.
That’s all for the 11th edition of the Judit Polgar Global Chess Festival, but let’s hope it’s back in Budapest in 2026!ย ย
The Global Chess Festival 2025 took place in the Hungarian National Gallery in Budapest on September 30, aiming “to share the beauty of chess” by connecting millions of people all around the world. One of the highlights saw Judit Polgar face six communities in a simultaneous exhibition.ย
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