GMs Magnus Carlsen, Arjun Erigaisi, Hikaru Nakamura, and Alireza Firouzja are the players left in the Winners Bracket after day one of the 2025 Chessable Masters Playoffs. Firouzja's match against GM Fabiano Caruana was the longest and closest, only decided in armageddon tiebreaks.

GMs Wesley So, Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu, Alexander Grischuk, and Sam Sevian were eliminated after two match losses. The following players are on their last lives in the Losers Bracket: GMs Caruana, Andrey Esipenko, Vladislav Artemiev, Ian Nepomniachtchi, Wei Yi, Jan-Krzysztof Duda, Yu Yangyi, and Anish Giri. 

Day two of the Playoffs is on Wednesday, February 19, starting at 11:00 a.m. ET / 17:00 CET / 9:30 p.m. IST.

We've reached the main event of the Chessable Masters, the Playoffs. For the next four days, players will have two lives in the double-elimination bracket; that is, they can lose two matches before they're eliminated. On top of prize money, competitors also vie for CCT points; after two events, the top-12 on the leaderboard qualify for the 2025 Esports World Cup.

Matches are best-of-four in the Winners Bracket, best-of-two in the Losers, with an armageddon tiebreak if needed. The time control is the same as previous days, 10 minutes for each side with no increment.

Winners Bracket: Carlsen, Arjun, Nakamura, Firouzja On 2/2 Match Wins

Carlsen, Arjun, and Nakamura had the clearest match victories. Firouzja's match against Caruana was, by far, the closest battle.

Carlsen Undefeated Even With Internet Scare

Carlsen defeated Esipenko 3-1 in the Round of 16 before going on to send Yu to the Losers Bracket 2.5-0.5 in the Winners Quarterfinals. While the scores look convincing on paper, his opponents had winning positions in each match.

In the first match, Carlsen won his best game in game one. He was then likely to flag Esipenko in game two when the latter pre-moved a stalemate trick that worked! Even the world number-one looked amused.