Alireza Firouzja (Persian: علیرضا فیروزجا, pronounced [æliːɾeˈzɒː fiːɾuːzˈdʒɒː]; born 18 June 2003) is an Iranian and French chess grandmaster.

Firouzja is the youngest player to have surpassed a FIDE rating of 2800, beating the previous record set by Magnus Carlsen by more than five months.

In 2021, at 18, he won the FIDE Grand Swiss tournament and an individual gold medal at the European Team Chess Championship.

He then took part in the strongest open tournament held that year, the Qatar Masters 2015, in which he scored 4½/9, including victories against grandmasters Pavel Tregubov and Neelotpal Das.

Later that year, he played in the Asian Nations Cup for Iran in which he scored 5½/7 on board 4 and a notable draw against grandmaster Wei Yi, who was at that time the youngest supergrandmaster in the world.

In April 2017, Firouzja had his best performance to date when he scored 6/9 in the Aeroflot Open 2017, a tournament of about 80 grandmasters, including several players in the top 100.

Later that year, the 2nd Stars cup tournament took place in Iran, again with an impressive list of foreign grandmasters: Baadur Jobava, Loek Van Wely, Alexei Shirov, Lázaro Bruzón Batista, Eltaj Safarli and Ivan Sokolov.

[21] At the 2018 World Rapid Championship held in Saint Petersburg, Firouzja finished in sixth place in a field of world-class players, behind Daniil Dubov, Shakhriyar Mamedyarov, Hikaru Nakamura, Vladislav Artemiev and Magnus Carlsen.

Starting as the 169th seed in a tournament of 206 participants, Firouzja scored 10/15 (+8−3=4) with a performance rating of 2848, the second-highest in the event, behind winner Dubov.

[27] In April, Firouzja competed in the Chess.com Bullet Chess Championship, losing in the quarterfinals to the eventual winner Hikaru Nakamura.

This was in line with Iranian government policy, as Iran does not recognise the state of Israel and sanctions players who compete against Israelis.

[31] In May, Firouzja faced Peruvian grandmaster José Martinez-Alcantara in round one of the 2019 Junior Speed Chess Championship, an online blitz and bullet competition hosted by Chess.com.

This was the first time that Firouzja faced the world elite in a classical round-robin tournament, and he said in an interview that his expectations were not oriented towards winning the event, but gaining more experience at the top level.

[48] In February, Firouzja competed in the Masters section of the Prague International Chess Festival, a 10-player category XIX round-robin event, as a late replacement for Wei Yi, who could not attend due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Firouzja finished in second place, behind World Champion Magnus Carlsen and ahead of Levon Aronian, Fabiano Caruana and Jan-Krzysztof Duda.

In his final round matchup against Radosław Wojtaszek, the arbiters suggested mid-game that the two move to a different table, irritating Firouzja.

[54][55] The game ultimately ended in a draw, and Firouzja placed fifth in the tournament with a score of 8/13 (+4-1=8), level with Andrey Esipenko and Fabiano Caruana on points who finished third and fourth, respectively.

[61] That same month Firouzja represented France in the European Team Chess Championship, where he scored 8/9 against grandmaster opposition for a tournament performance rating of over 3000.

"[65] From 29 to 30 December, Firouzja also participated in the World Blitz Chess Championship, where he tied for first place with Maxime Vachier-Lagrave and Jan-Krzysztof Duda, scoring 15/21 points.

As the top seed going into the event, he finished with a -1 score with 1 win and 2 losses in the 10 player single robin super tournament, tying for 7th place with Ian Nepomniachtchi.

[67] From 16 June to 5 July, Firouzja participated in the 2022 Candidates Tournament held in Madrid, Spain, having qualified to play by winning the Grand Swiss in 2021.

[69] Firouzja did not play in the 44th Chess Olympiad in Chennai, along with Vachier-Lagrave and Étienne Bacrot, citing exhaustion and hot weather.

[71] From 26 to 30 August, Firouzja participated in the Saint Louis Rapid & Blitz tournament as part of the Grand Chess Tour and won first place with four rounds to spare.

[72] On 11 September, Firouzja won the Sinquefield Cup, a 9[b] player round robin tournament, after defeating Ian Nepomniachtchi in a rapid tiebreak match.

[73] He finished with a score of 5/8 (+3-1=5) [c] and his Sinquefield cup victory in Saint Louis earned him $87,500 alongside his $100,000 bonus for winning the Grand Chess Tour with a 6½ point lead ahead of runner-up, Wesley So.

On the verge of scoring a hat-trick in Saint Louis,[e] Firouzja eventually lost the playoff against Caruana after losing the armageddon game, stumbling into a zugzwang with the black pieces.

[81] He later surpassed So after playing in the Open de Rouen, securing his spot in the Candidates with a perfect score of 7/7 and a victory over former FIDE World Championship finalist Gata Kamsky.

[86] In October, Grandmaster Alireza Firouzja's team, Triveni Continental Kings, won the 2024 Tech Mahindra Global Chess League.

He would finish in first place in the group stage before falling in the quarter-finals to local player Vincent Keymer, who would go on to win the tournament.

[88] He would then compete in the 2025 Chessable Masters tournament, part of the Champions Chess Tour, having been directly invited to the knockout stage.