Yeoh Li Tian

Yeoh Li Tian (born 16 October 1999) is a Malaysian chess grandmaster (GM) and a two-time Malaysian Chess Champion.

Yeoh Li Tian 杨理天
Country	Malaysia
Born	(1999-10-16) October 16, 1999 (age 25) Petaling Jaya, Malaysia
Title	Grandmaster (2025)
FIDE rating	2490 (August 2025)
Peak rating	2530 (September 2019)

Chess career

Yeoh won the Malaysian Chess Championship in 2015 and 2016.^[1] In 2017 he won the FIDE Zone 3.3 Championship on tiebreak from Nguyễn Ngọc Trường Sơn. Thanks to this victory, Yeoh received an automatical award of the title International Master. He also achieved a norm for the title Grandmaster, the first ever by a Malaysian, and became the first Malaysian ever to qualify to play in the FIDE World Cup.^[2][3] In this latter event, held in Batumi later in the same year, Yeoh was eliminated by former world champion Viswanathan Anand in the first round.

In the 2019 Philippines Southeast Asian Games, Yeoh delivered Malaysia's first ever Rapid Chess gold in the Sea Games.^[4]

He achieved his last GM norm in 2025, leading him to make history by becoming the first Grandmaster from Malaysia.^[5]

Personal life

Yeoh is a former student of Catholic High School, Petaling Jaya. He studied mathematics at Imperial College London and underwent his masters at the University of Malaya.