The Superbet Romania Chess Classic is the classical leg of the Grand Chess Tour held annually in Bucharest. The 2026 edition ran from May 6 to 16 at the JW Marriott Bucharest Grand Hotel, with ten elite grandmasters playing a nine-round round-robin at classical time control.
The GCT is a multi-event series founded in 2015 that combines five or six classical, rapid, and blitz tournaments held across the year. Players earn points based on individual event placements; the overall GCT winner is decided by the cumulative leaderboard. The Bucharest event has been the opening classical leg of every GCT season since 2021 and has been won twice by Magnus Carlsen (2021 and 2022) and once each by Levon Aronian (2024) and Wesley So (2023).
The 2026 edition’s prize fund of $350,000 is among the highest in the GCT calendar, with $90,000 to the winner. The schedule features one rest day in the middle of the event and runs typically as a one-game-per-day round-robin — modest by some elite tournament standards but standard for the GCT format.
Sponsorship by Superbet (a Romanian betting and entertainment group) has made the tournament one of the chess-world’s better-funded annual events, with all games broadcast live with engine analysis, multiple language commentary, and integration into the Chess.com and Lichess broadcast ecosystems.
For round-by-round broadcast, final standings, and the Grand Chess Tour leaderboard, see the official site linked in the right column.