Hikaru Nakamura's IQ Score

Hikaru Nakamura has no documented IQ score, and no reliable figure circulates. A chess rating measures chess strength against other players, it isn't an IQ and can't be converted into one.

Hirakata, Japan → White Plains, New York · 1987–2003

A stepfather who was a chess coach

Born 9 December 1987 in Hirakata, Osaka, to a Japanese father and an American mother. The family moved to the US when he was two; after his parents separated, his mother married Sunil Weeramantry, a Sri Lankan-born chess master and teacher, who began coaching Hikaru and his older brother Asuka.

Hikaru was the more reluctant of the two at first, then started breaking records Bobby Fischer had held for decades.

RECORD (AMERICAN)FISCHERNAKAMURA

Youngest US chess master13 years old10 years, 79 days (1998)

Youngest US grandmaster15 years, 6 months15 years, 79 days (2003)

A chess education, not a college one

He went from school straight into professional chess. What he studied (and how) is the record that matters.

from ~7Home coachingTrained by his stepfather Sunil Weeramantry, who wrote chess books and ran school chess programmes.

1990sNew York chess clubsPlayed rated games relentlessly at local clubs and scholastic events around New York.

to 2005High school, New York areaFinished school while already a grandmaster and US champion.

2000sInternet Chess ClubPlayed thousands of speed games online, a new kind of training his generation pioneered.

2010sKasparovWorked with Garry Kasparov as a trainer for a period in 2011.

Set the clock

He's strong at every speed, but the faster the clock, the more he stands out. Pick a time control, then tap the clock to play a move and feel how little time that is.

Blitz

His signature format: he has been world No. 1 or No. 2 in FIDE blitz for much of the past decade and won major online blitz and Speed Chess events many times.

≈ 4.5 s per move over a 40-move game