Scrabble is a word game in which two to four players score points by placing tiles, each bearing a single letter, onto a game board divided into a 15×15 grid of squares. The tiles must form words that, in crossword fashion, read left to right in rows or downward in columns, and be included in a standard dictionary or lexicon.
The World Scrabble Championship (WSC) is the most-prestigious title in competitive English-language Scrabble. It was held every second year after 1991 until 2013 when it began to be held annually. It has been an open event since 2014. Although the official brand name and organizations of the event have changed over recent years, many Scrabble enthusiasts from more than 30 countries compete to become World Scrabble Champion. The reigning World Scrabble Champion is Nigel Richards, who won his fourth title at the 2018 Mattel World Scrabble Championships by winning the final in London in 2018.
The North American Scrabble Championship is the largest Scrabble competition in North America. The event is currently held every year, and from 2004 through 2006 the finals were aired on ESPN and ESPN2. The 2019 event was held in Reno from July 20-24, 2019, with Alec Sjöholm emerging as champion.
Pakorn Nemitrmansuk is one of Thailand's top Scrabble players and the 2009 World Scrabble Champion. An architect and resident of Bangkok, Thailand, Nemitrmansuk has competed at World Scrabble Championship six times between 1999–2011 and was the runner-up in 2003 and 2005.
Helen Gipson is a Scrabble player. On 4 December 2005 her ABSP rating peaked at third in Britain, making her the highest rated woman, and she is consistently rated as the top female player in the world. In January 2009 she won the UK Open beating a strong field including the world champion Nigel Richards.
Francophone Scrabble, or French-language Scrabble, is played by many thousands of amateurs throughout the world and the Fédération internationale de Scrabble francophone has more than 20,000 members. Just as in English, points are scored by playing valid words from the lettered tiles. In French there are 102 tiles - 100 lettered tiles and two blanks known as jokers. The official word list for Francophone Scrabble is L'Officiel du jeu Scrabble.
Dave Wiegand is an American Scrabble player who won the National Scrabble Championship in 2005 and 2009.
The first World Youth Scrabble Championships were held in Wollongong, Australia 2006. Competitors from Australia, Bahrain, Canada, England, Hong Kong, India, Indonesia, Kenya, Kuwait, Malaysia, New Zealand, Nigeria, Oman, Pakistan, Philippines, Qatar, Singapore, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Thailand, Trinidad and Tobago, United Arab Emirates and United States have competed in the annual tournament so far. WYSC is open to anyone under the age of 18 on 1 January of the year of each tournament. The tournament used to be held at the start of December but was brought forward to August for 2014. So far the WYSC tournament has been held in Malaysia five times, Australia twice, Dubai twice and the Philippines, Sri Lanka, and the United Kingdom once each.
David Lawrence Gibson was an American professional Scrabble player and mathematics professor. Ranked the top player in North America and widely regarded as one of the greatest Scrabble players, Gibson won the North American Scrabble Championship twice.
The World Scrabble Championship 2007 was held in the Taj President Hotel, Mumbai, India between 9 November and 12 November. The winner was Nigel Richards of New Zealand.
Nigel Richards is a New Zealand–Malaysian Scrabble player who is among the most successful players of all time. Born and raised in New Zealand, Richards became World Champion in 2007, and repeated the feat in 2011, 2013, 2018, and 2019, and remains the only person to have won the title more than once. He also won the third World English-Language Scrabble Players’ Association Championship (WESPAC) in 2019.
The UK National Scrabble Championship (NSC) is a British national Scrabble tournament that has been held annually since its inception in 1971. It was formerly organised by Mattel, the copyright owners of Scrabble in the UK, and has been organised by the Association of British Scrabble Players (ABSP) since 2014. It is one of five major tournaments in the UK, the other four being the UK Open, the British Isles Elimination Scrabble Tournament (BEST), the British Matchplay Scrabble Championship (BMSC) and the UK Masters. The current UK champion is Phil Robertshaw.
The World Scrabble Championship 2011 was held in the Hilton Hotel, Warsaw, Poland, from 12 October to 16 October 2011. The format was a 34-round preliminary tournament and a best-of-five final. The top two players after the preliminary tournament, Nigel Richards and Andrew Fisher, played a best-of-five final for the top prize and the title of World Scrabble Champion 2011. There were 114 places allocated to competitors from around the world, with 106 players eventually competing.
The UK OPEN Scrabble Tournament is a British Scrabble tournament that was first organised in 2008. It is one of five major flagship tournaments overseen by the Association of British Scrabble Players (ABSP).
The World Scrabble Championship 2013, renamed by Mattel to Scrabble Champions Tournament, was held in Andel's Hotel, Prague, Czech Republic during December 2013.
The World Scrabble Championship 2014, renamed by Mattel to Scrabble Champions Tournament in 2013, was held at the ExCeL London Exhibition and Convention Centre, London in November 2014. It was the first time that the World Championship had become an open event when MSI invited all players to compete. However, due to the high entry fee and high venue cost, only 108 players entered and the prize money had to be limited.
Brett Smitheram is a Scrabble Grand Master and one of the most successful players in the world. Smitheram won the 2016 World Scrabble Championship, and has been ranked as a UK Scrabble Grand Master for nearly 20 years. Originally from Camborne, Cornwall, he lives in Battersea, London and is the Head of Talent for HeliosX, a group of companies in the medtech space, including Dermatica, MedExpress, ZipHealth and Beauty & The Bear.
The MSI World Scrabble Championship 2016 was a Scrabble tournament organised by Mattel and Mindsports International (MSI) to determine the world champion in English Scrabble. It was held from 31 August to 4 September 2016 in Lille, France.
The Mattel World Scrabble Championship 2018 was a Scrabble tournament organised by Mattel and Mindsports Academy (MSA) to determine the world champion in English Scrabble held from 23 to 28 October 2018.
The Mattel World Scrabble Championship 2019 was a Scrabble tournament organised by Mattel and Mindsports Academy (MSA) to determine the world champion in English Scrabble held from 19 to 24 November 2019.
