Hou Yifan

Hou Yifan
Hou Yifan in 2013 at the Grand Prix Geneva
Country	China
Born	(1994-02-27) 27 February 1994 (age 22) Xinghua, Jiangsu, China
Title	Grandmaster (2008) Woman Grandmaster
Women's World Champion	2010–2012 2013–2015 2016-
FIDE rating	2651 (February 2017)
Peak rating	2686 (March 2015)

Hou Yifan

侯逸凡

Hou Yifan (Chinese: 侯逸凡; pinyin: Hóu Yìfán pronunciation ) (born 27 February 1994, Xinghua, Jiangsu, China) is a Chinese chess grandmaster and former chess prodigy. She is the current Women's World Chess Champion, the youngest ever to win the title, as well as the youngest female player ever to qualify for the title of Grandmaster.

At the age of 12, Hou became the youngest player ever to participate in the FIDE Women's World Championship (Yekaterinburg 2006) and the Chess Olympiad (Torino 2006). In June 2007, she became China's youngest National Women's Champion ever. She achieved the titles of Woman FIDE Master in January 2004, Woman Grandmaster in January 2007, and Grandmaster in August 2008. In 2010, she became the youngest Women's World Chess Champion in history by winning the 2010 Women's World Championship in Hatay, Turkey at age 16. In the Women's World Chess Championship 2012 she was eliminated early, but she regained the title in 2013, defeating Anna Ushenina. She forfeited the title by not playing in the 2015 Championship for scheduling reasons, but defeated that tournament's winner Mariya Muzychuk in the 2016 World Championship match to regain the title.