The Women's World Chess Championship 2004 took place from May 21 to June 4, 2004 in Elista, Russia.
It was won by Antoaneta Stefanova, who beat Ekaterina Kovalevskaya in the final by 2½ to ½.
[2] Notable top players not taking part was Judit Polgár (ranked the no.
1 woman in the world - and 9th overall), Xie Jun (ranked 2nd), Zhu Chen (8th), Qin Kanying (14th), Inna Gaponenko (18th) and Sofia Polgar (19th).
Notably, this was the second Women's World Championship in a row in which the reigning champion (in this case Zhu Chen) did not attempt to defend their title.