Norway Chess 2026 R4: Carlsen Back In Business After Beating Gukesh

World number-one Magnus Carlsen beat World Champion Gukesh Dommaraju in the only classical win of round four of Norway Chess 2026, exorcising the ghost of their infamous table-slam game from the 2025 event. GM Alireza Firouzja continues to lead the tournament despite losing to GM Wesley So in armageddon, while GM Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu is in sole second place after beating GM Vincent Keymer in armageddon. It could have been better for the Indian star, since he was winning toward the end of their classical encounter.

All three classical games in round four of Norway Chess Women 2026 ended in draws. GM Bibisara Assaubayeva leads with seven points after beating Women’s World Champion Ju Wenjun in armageddon. A point and a half behind are the two players who won armageddon encounters, GMs Anna Muzychuk and Zhu Jiner, as well as GM Divya Deshmukh, despite hanging her queen and suffering a loss. Ju is on four points and GM Koneru Humpy drops to last place with three.

Round five starts Saturday, May 30, at 11 a.m. ET / 17:00 CEST / 8:30 p.m. IST.

This is a flash report—come back later for full coverage of round four!

Once again Carlsen’s game saw the day’s only three-point classical win, but this time he was on the right side of the result. 

Norway Chess Round 4 Results

Norway Chess Round 4: Carlsen Gets Revenge Over Gukesh 

Carlsen is right back in the hunt in Oslo after his first classical win took him up to mid-table, while Firouzja is still the sole leader but is now within touching distance for both Praggnanandhaa and So. 

Norway Chess Standings After Round 4

Our Game of the Day is Carlsen’s win with the black pieces over Gukesh, which GM Dejan Bojkov analyzes below.

Norway Chess Women Round 4: Assaubayeva Extends Her Lead 

Going into the rest day, Assaubayeva holds a 1.5-point lead over Muzychuk, Divya, and Zhu. 

Norway Chess Women Standings After Round 4

Firouzja has White against Keymer on Saturday, while Assaubayeva is Black against Muzychuk.

Round 5 Pairings

NM Anthony Levin contributed to this report.

How to watch?

You can watch Norway Chess 2026 on the Chess24 YouTube and Twitch channels. The games can also be followed from our events page: Open | Women.

Norway Chess 2026 features Open and Women’s six-player tournaments for equal prize funds of 1,690,000 NOK (~$182k). It runs May 25 to June 5 in Oslo, with players facing their opponents twice at classical chess (120 minutes/40 moves, with a 10-second increment from move 41). The winner of a classical game gets three points, the loser, zero; after a draw, the players get one point and fight for another half-point in armageddon (10 minutes for White, seven for Black, who has draw odds). 

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