TTS Language Rankings
The TTS language dropdown in En Parlant~ is ordered by global chess-playing population per language community. This gives the most relevant languages the highest visibility for our users.
Methodology
Section titled “Methodology”Rankings are derived from three data sources:
- FIDE rated players by federation (1.64M total globally, May 2025)
- Chess.com account data by country (July 2024 census of 241 countries)
- Chess culture indicators — grandmaster count, per-capita engagement, historical tradition depth
For multi-country languages (e.g. Spanish covers Spain + 18 Latin American countries), all countries are aggregated.
Ranking (March 2026)
Section titled “Ranking (March 2026)”| Rank | Code | Language | Key Rationale |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | en | English | USA (#1 online), UK, India, Canada, Australia. ~1.65M Chess.com accounts combined. 200+ GMs. |
| 2 | es | Spanish | Spain (24.8K FIDE, 56 GMs) + Mexico, Argentina, Colombia, Peru, Chile. ~960K combined. |
| 3 | hi | Hindi | India: 32.5K FIDE, 85 GMs, 500K+ Chess.com. #2 chess nation. Gukesh youngest World Champion 2024. |
| 4 | ru | Russian | Soviet legacy: 256 GMs, 34.8K FIDE. Russia + Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, Belarus. ~490K combined. |
| 5 | de | German | Germany (26.5K FIDE, 96 GMs) + Austria, Switzerland. ~499K combined. Highest FIDE participation in Europe. |
| 6 | fr | French | France (23.4K FIDE, 50 GMs) + Belgium, Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia. ~680K combined. Growing Francophone Africa base. |
| 7 | pt | Portuguese | Brazil (413K Chess.com) + Portugal. ~546K combined. Large casual player base. |
| 8 | ar | Arabic | Egypt (222K), Morocco (127K), Saudi Arabia (87K), Algeria, Iraq, UAE, Tunisia. ~750K combined but lower FIDE depth. |
| 9 | fil | Filipino | Philippines: 453K Chess.com (#3 globally). Wesley So, Eugene Torre. Huge casual chess culture. |
| 10 | id | Indonesian | Indonesia: 411K Chess.com (#6 globally). Large online population. |
| 11 | pl | Polish | Poland: 249K Chess.com, 12K+ FIDE, 45 GMs. Very strong tradition. |
| 12 | it | Italian | Italy: 289K Chess.com, 16 GMs. Growing scene. |
| 13 | uk | Ukrainian | Ukraine: 325K Chess.com, 93 GMs (#4 worldwide). Extraordinarily strong per-capita. |
| 14 | tr | Turkish | Turkey: 300K Chess.com. Rapidly growing youth development. |
| 15 | vi | Vietnamese | Vietnam: 257K Chess.com. Le Quang Liem (World Blitz Champion 2013). |
| 16 | nl | Dutch | Netherlands: 146K Chess.com, 36 GMs. Historic power (Euwe, Timman, Giri). |
| 17 | ko | Korean | South Korea: 100K Chess.com. Go dominates but chess growing. |
| 18 | zh | Chinese | China: 48 GMs, Ding Liren (World Champion 2023), but only 18K Chess.com — Xiangqi dominates domestically. |
| 19 | sv | Swedish | Sweden: 97K Chess.com. Strong Scandinavian tradition. |
| 20 | ro | Romanian | Romania: 87K Chess.com, 22 GMs. Strong Eastern European tradition. |
| 21 | cs | Czech | Czech Republic: 61K Chess.com, 36 GMs. Highest active-player percentage of any major federation. |
| 22 | hu | Hungarian | Hungary: 48K Chess.com, 58 GMs. Judit Polgar, Rapport. Incredible per-capita GM production. |
| 23 | no | Norwegian | Norway: 64K Chess.com. Magnus Carlsen effect — chess became prime-time TV. |
| 24 | el | Greek | Greece + Cyprus: ~66K Chess.com combined. Moderate tradition. |
| 25 | da | Danish | Denmark: 49K Chess.com. Bent Larsen legacy. |
| 26 | bg | Bulgarian | Bulgaria: 39K Chess.com. Topalov (former World Champion). |
| 27 | fi | Finnish | Finland: 45K Chess.com. Nordic chess tradition. |
| 28 | ms | Malay | Malaysia: 192K Chess.com. First GM (Yeoh Li Tian) only in 2025. |
| 29 | th | Thai | Thailand: 46K Chess.com. Growing scene. |
| 30 | hr | Croatian | Croatia: 37K Chess.com. Several strong GMs. |
| 31 | sk | Slovak | Slovakia: 25K Chess.com. Active FIDE scene relative to population. |
| 32 | bn | Bengali | Bangladesh: 63K Chess.com. First South Asian GM (Niaz Murshed, 1987). |
| 33 | ta | Tamil | Tamil Nadu produces 31 of India’s 85 GMs (Anand, Gukesh, Praggnanandhaa), but hard to separate from Hindi/English stats. |
| 34 | ja | Japanese | Japan: 37K Chess.com, 0 GMs. Shogi and Go dominate board game culture. |
Notable Observations
Section titled “Notable Observations”- Filipino and Indonesian rank higher than their GM counts suggest because of massive online chess populations (Philippines is #3 on Chess.com globally).
- Chinese ranks lower than its elite strength because Xiangqi dominates casual play domestically.
- Hungarian has only 48K online accounts but 58 GMs — the highest GM-per-capita ratio of any country.
- Arabic aggregates many countries with large Chess.com populations but relatively thin organized chess infrastructure.