[1] In 1991, Polgár achieved the title of Grandmaster at the age of 15 years and 4 months, at the time the youngest to have done so, breaking the record previously held by former world champion Bobby Fischer.

[a] She has won or shared first in the chess tournaments of Hastings 1993, Madrid 1994, León 1996, U.S. Open 1998, Hoogeveen 1999, Sigeman & Co 2000, Japfa 2000, and the Najdorf Memorial 2000.

[5] Polgár is the only woman to have won a game against a reigning world number one player, and has defeated eleven current or former world champions in either rapid or classical chess: Magnus Carlsen, Anatoly Karpov, Garry Kasparov, Vladimir Kramnik, Boris Spassky, Vasily Smyslov, Veselin Topalov, Viswanathan Anand, Ruslan Ponomariov, Alexander Khalifman, and Rustam Kasimdzhanov.

Milorad Boskovic related a conversation with Judit's sixth-round opponent, a Yugoslav player he knew to be a strong expert: "He told me he took some chances in the game because he couldn't believe she was going to attack so well.

[43][44] In October 1988, she finished first in a 10-player round-robin tournament in London, scoring 7–2, for a half point lead over Israeli GM Yair Kraidman.

David Norwood, British GM, in recalling Judit beating him when he was an established player and she was just a child, described her as "this cute little auburn-haired monster who crushed you.

"[56] British journalist Dominic Lawson wrote about 12-year-old Judit's "killer" eyes and how she would stare at her opponent: "The irises are so grey, so dark they are almost indistinguishable from the pupils.

The men's team consisted of Lev Polugaevsky, Wolfgang Uhlmann, Oscar Panno, Efim Geller, Borislav Ivkov and Vasily Smyslov.

Russian GM Evgeny Bareev, at the time ranked eighth in the world, led going into tournament's last round, but was defeated by Polgár in their second individual game, allowing her to share first.

Susan Polgár met Bobby with her family and persuaded him to come out of hiding "in a cramped hotel room in a small Yugoslavian village".

Against a field which included Gata Kamsky, Evgeny Bareev, Valery Salov and Ivan Sokolov, she finished 7–2 and 1½ points ahead of second place.

Eight grandmasters participated, all considered contenders for the world championship: Karpov, Anand, Salov, Ivanchuk, Kamsky, Shirov, Ljubojević and Polgár.

[93][94] In the Antillean island of Aruba in November 1995, she played in a friendly match against Jeroen Piket of the Netherlands, at the time one of the top players in Europe.

[100] The incident was caught on tape by a crew from the Spanish television company PVS, and the videotape showed that Kasparov's fingers had left the knight.

[104] At the time the video had not been publicly released, at the request of tournament sponsor Luis Rentero,[100] but it is now available on Youtube Archived 19 June 2022 at the Wayback Machine.

[116] In April 1997, she played in the Dos Hermanas Chess tournament, a single-round robin category XIX event of 10 of the world's best players.

"[120] In January 1998, she played in the category XVII event, the Hoogovens in Wijk aan Zee, Netherlands, in which 14 of the world's top grandmasters participated.

She finished in the middle of the pack, tied for sixth–tenth position with Karpov, Topalov and Jeroen Piket and an even score of 6½ points in thirteen games.

Jan Timman led early in the tournament, but Polgár staged a comeback scoring 3 points in the last 4 games to share first place.

The Japfa Classic in Denpasar, Bali, Indonesia, was a category XVI event of 10 players which included Alexander Khalifman–at the time FIDE world champion– and Anatoly Karpov–his predecessor.

While the Hungarian team narrowly missed winning the bronze medal, Polgár finished 10/13 for the second highest points total of any player in the Olympiad[140] and a rated performance level of 2772.

[141] In late February and early March 2001, Polgár played in the elite Linares double round-robin invitational of six of the world's strongest players.

In a quarterfinal playoff blitz game, she forced Joël Lautier, France's strongest player, to resign in 12 moves when she won his queen which resulted in the audience of several hundred bursting into applause.

[161] In August 2003, Polgár played an eight-game rapid chess match in Mainz, Germany against Viswanathan Anand, billed as the "Battle of the Sexes".

In one of her games against Karpov, he blundered, allowing Polgár to utilize a famous double bishop sacrifice first employed by Emanuel Lasker against Bauer in 1889.

The tournament, which was now considered by some as the most important in Europe, was won by fellow Hungarian Péter Lékó while Polgár scored 7/13 to tie for fourth with Alexander Grischuk, Michael Adams and Kramnik.

[186][187][188] In November 2007, she took part in Chess Champions League – Playing for a Better World in Vitoria Gasteiz, Spain a tournament to raise funds for equipment for a Hospital in Mbuji-Mayi, DR Congo.

[191] In November 2008, Polgár had a terrible result in The World Chess Blitz Championship in Almaty, Republic of Kazakhstan, finished last of the 16 players with only 2½ points.

[192] In November 2008, Polgár played the number 2 board for the Hungarian open ("men's") team in the 38th Chess Olympiad in Dresden, finishing 3½/8.

[214] In September 2011, Polgár finally returned to "Super GM" status with a FIDE rating of 2701 and by November she had raised it to 2710 and ranked 35 in the world.