Chess grandmaster Magnus Carlsen on how AI and tech are changing the game

When Magnus Carlsen started playing chess at the age of eight, he grew up in “a hybrid generation,” mainly playing on the board, he tells Euronews Next in an interview.

Fast forward 25 years and the five-time classical world champion, who has been the undisputed number one since 2011, says that the Internet has allowed more people to learn about the game and be entertained. 

Carlsen’s next move is to turn the chess craze into a spectator sport. Last week, he launched his chess app Take Take Take, which he says is not just another chess app. 

Rather than offering users a chance to play, it provides daily tournament recap videos and analyses player performance during major tournaments. Carlsen will of course give his own analysis. 

The platform aims to serve as a “home” for the 600 million people who play chess worldwide and notify users when their favourite players have a game.

“I've heard from people that they want to watch me play, for instance. But they don't know when I'm playing because this information is not so easy to find if you're not always following the chess scene,” Carlsen says. 

The Norwegian grandmaster already has a YouTube channel with 1.3 million subscribers but said he wanted to build a separate platform as it gives people a way to follow a chess match instead of just offering his own content. 

Take Take Take, named after the back-and-forth exchanges of chess pieces, has a well-known list of investors including Peter Thiel and Breakthrough Initiatives fund.

The app will be free to use but could be monetised with adverts and premium features. 

This isn’t Carlsen’s first chess venture. His first app, Play Magnus, allowed users to play a bot version of him at different stages of his career. It was later sold to