Inarkiev, who was named after Ernesto "Che" Guevara,[3] was born in Khaidarkan, Kyrgyzstan[2] (then part of the Soviet Union).

In 2000, he accepted Kirsan Ilyumzhinov's offer to move to Elista with his family[2] and started to represent the Russian Chess Federation and Kalmykia.

Co-organizer of the chess festival "Tower of Concord", annually organized by sports club "Adi Ahmad" in Ingushetia from 2016.

The main event of the festival is the match Inarkiev played against invited stars - Boris Gelfand in 2016[13] and 2017,[14] Wei Yi in 2018[15] and Sergey Karjakin in 2019.

Inarkiev was involved in a rules controversy at the 2017 World Blitz Championship during his game against Magnus Carlsen.

The arbiter awarded Inarkiev the victory, but the decision was quickly overturned by the chief arbiter, who ruled that Carlsen’s move was not technically illegal even though it resulted in an illegal position and invited the participants to continue the game from the position in which it was stopped.