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Hou Yifan

In this Chinese name, the family name is Hou.
Hou Yifan
Hou in 2016
Born (1994-02-27) 27 February 1994 (age 30)
Xinghua, China
EducationPeking University (BA)
St Hilda's College, Oxford (MPP)
Chess career
CountryChina
TitleGrandmaster (2008)
Women's World Champion2010–2012
2013–2015
2016–2017
FIDE rating2633 (November 2024)
Peak rating2686 (March 2015)
Peak rankingNo. 55 (May 2015)
Chinese name
Chinese侯逸凡
Transcriptions
Standard Mandarin
Hanyu PinyinHóu Yìfán
Wade–GilesHou I-Fan
IPA[xǒʊ îfǎn]
Yue: Cantonese
Yale RomanizationHaùh jaht fàahn
JyutpingHau4 jat6 faan4
IPA[hɐ̏u jɐ̀t fȁːn]
Southern Min
Hokkien POJHâu E̍k-hōan

Hou Yifan (Chinese: 侯逸凡; pinyin: Hóu Yìfán ; born 27 February 1994)[1][2][3] is a Chinese chess grandmaster, four-time Women's World Chess Champion and professor at Shenzhen University. She is the second highest rated female player of all time.[4] A chess prodigy, she was the youngest female player ever to qualify for the title of grandmaster (at the age of 14 years, 6 months, 16 days) and the youngest ever to win the Women's World Chess Championship (at age 16).

At the age of 12, Hou became the youngest player ever to participate in the Women's World Championship (Yekaterinburg 2006) and the Chess Olympiad (Torino 2006).[5] In June 2007, she became the youngest Chinese Women's Champion ever. She achieved the titles of Woman FIDE Master in January 2004, Woman Grandmaster in January 2007, and Grandmaster in August 2008. In 2010, she won the 2010 Women's World Championship in Hatay, Turkey at age 16. She won the next three championships in which the title was decided by a match (in 2011, 2013 and 2016, with a total of ten wins to zero losses and fourteen draws against three different opponents), but was either eliminated early or she declined to participate in the championships in which the title was decided by a knockout tournament (in 2012, 2015 and 2017).

Hou was the third woman ever to be rated among the world's top 100 players (2014–16 and 2017–22), after Maia Chiburdanidze and Judit Polgár. She is widely regarded as the best active female chess player, "leaps and bounds" ahead of her competitors.[6] As of May 2024, she has been the No. 1 ranked woman in the world since September 2015 and is 73 points ahead of the No. 2 ranked Ju Wenjun.[7] She was named in the BBC's 100 Women programme in 2017.[8]

Hou has been semi-retired from competitive chess since 2018. In 2020, she became the youngest professor at Shenzhen University, at the age of 26.[4]

  1. ^ Hou Yifan Archived 2012-09-06 at archive.today New in Chess NICBase Online Info.
  2. ^ 侯逸凡 (in Simplified Chinese). China Chess League. 13 June 2006. Archived from the original on 4 January 2009. Retrieved 9 September 2008.
  3. ^ "chesspawn.net". chesspawn.net. Archived from the original on 14 March 2012. Retrieved 25 April 2014.
  4. ^ a b Chess: Hou Yifan, No 1 woman and professor at 26, loses in online return, Leonard Barden, The Guardian, 17 July 2020
  5. ^ Newsmakers, Beijing Review PEOPLE/POINTS NO.40, 2008
  6. ^ "Hou Yifan leads Monaco Womens' [sic] Grand Prix". ChessBase. 13 October 2015. Retrieved 2 December 2015.
  7. ^ "Standard Top 100 Women". FIDE.
  8. ^ "BBC 100 Women 2017: Who is on the list?". BBC News. 20 October 2017. Retrieved 24 July 2019.

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