Ryūō

Ryūō is an annual Japanese professional [shogi player|professional] shogi tournament and the title of its winner. The current Ryūō title holder is Sōta Fujii.
The Ryūō Tournament is sponsored by the Yomiuri Shimbun as well as the title awarded to its winner. It is one of the eight major professional shogi title matches and was first held in 1988. Among the eight titles in the professional shogi titleholder system, Ryūō and Meijin are the most prestigious ones. However, the Ryūō title gives out the highest monetary prizeeven more than the Meijin title. Cash prizes are ¥44,000,000 for the winner of championship and new Ryūō titleholder, and ¥16,500,000 for the loser. Additional compensation includes ¥14,500,000 for the previous titleholder and ¥7,000,000 for the challenger.
This title should not be confused with that of Amateur Ryūō which is awarded each year to the winner of the Amateur Ryūō Tournament.

𝕏 yomiuri_ryuo

Name

[Image:Shogi rook p.jpg | thumb|125px | The dragon king]
The basic meaning of ryūō is a "promoted rook". It can move as both a rook and a silver during a turn and is one of the two most powerful pieces in shogi.

Tournament structure

The tournament consists of six class tournaments and one ladder-format challenger tournament. All currently active professional shogi players as well as qualifying women's professionals, apprentice professionals and amateurs are assigned to one of six classes. There are roughly 16 players each in Class 1 to Class 3, 32 players in Class 4 and Class 5, and then all remaining players are assigned to Class 6. The top players in these class tournaments are then seeded into the challenger tournament. The two players advancing to the final of the challenger tournament play a three-game match to determine the overall winner. In the title match, the first player to win four out of seven championship games becomes the new titleholder.

History

The Ryūō is a continuation of the earlier Tenth Dan title tournament. The Tenth Dan itself is a continuation of the Ninth Dan and the earlier 全日本選手権戦 tournaments, which were also sponsored by the same Yomiuri Shimbun. The 全日本選手権 tournament became a title tournament in 1950, where the title was known as the Ninth Dan title. Considering this lineage, the Ryūō is second historical title and the longest running title tournament apart from the Meijin title.

Lifetime Ryūō

"Lifetime Ryūō" is the title awarded to a player who wins the championship five times in a row or seven times in total. Active players may qualify for this title, but it is only officially awarded upon their retirement or death.
Three players have qualified for the Lifetime Ryūō title: Akira Watanabe, Yoshiharu Habu and Sōta Fujii. Watanabe qualified for the title by winning his fifth championship in a row in 2008, whereas Habu qualified by winning his 7th title overall in 2017. Fujii qualified after winning his fifth championship in a row in 2025. The three will be officially designated Lifetime Ryūō upon retirement or death.

Winners

The number in parentheses represents the cumulative times the player had won the title to date.

No.	Year	Winner	Score	Opponent
1	1988	Akira Shima	4-0	Kunio Yonenaga
2	1989	Yoshiharu Habu	4-3	Akira Shima
3	1990	Koji Tanigawa	4-1	Yoshiharu Habu
4	1991	Koji Tanigawa	4-2	Taku Morishita
5	1992	Yoshiharu Habu	4-3	Koji Tanigawa
6	1993	Yasumitsu Sato	4-2	Yoshiharu Habu
7	1994	Yoshiharu Habu	4-2	Yasumitsu Sato
8	1995	Yoshiharu Habu	4-2	Yasumitsu Sato
9	1996	Koji Tanigawa	4-1	Yoshiharu Habu
10	1997	Koji Tanigawa	4-0	Keiichi Sanada
11	1998	Takeshi Fujii	4-0	Koji Tanigawa
12	1999	Takeshi Fujii	4-1	Daisuke Suzuki
13	2000	Takeshi Fujii	4-3	Yoshiharu Habu
14	2001	Yoshiharu Habu	4-1	Takeshi Fujii
15	2002	Yoshiharu Habu	4-3	Takashi Abe
16	2003	Toshiyuki Moriuchi	4-0	Yoshiharu Habu
17	2004	Akira Watanabe	4-3	Toshiyuki Moriuchi
18	2005	Akira Watanabe	4-0	Kazuki Kimura
19	2006	Akira Watanabe	4-3	Yasumitsu Sato
20	2007	Akira Watanabe	4-2	Yasumitsu Sato
21	2008	Akira Watanabe	4-3	Yoshiharu Habu
22	2009	Akira Watanabe	4-0	Toshiyuki Moriuchi
23	2010	Akira Watanabe	4-2	Yoshiharu Habu
24	2011	Akira Watanabe	4-1	Tadahisa Maruyama
25	2012	Akira Watanabe	4-1	Tadahisa Maruyama
26	2013	Toshiyuki Moriuchi	4-1	Akira Watanabe
27	2014	Tetsurō Itodani	4-1	Toshiyuki Moriuchi
28	2015	Akira Watanabe	4-1	Tetsurō Itodani
29	2016	Akira Watanabe	4-3	Tadahisa Maruyama
30	2017	Yoshiharu Habu	4-1	Akira Watanabe
31	2018	Akihito Hirose	4-3	Yoshiharu Habu
32	2019	Masayuki Toyoshima	4-1	Akihito Hirose
33	2020		4-1	Yoshiharu Habu
34	2021	Sōta Fujii	4-0	Masayuki Toyoshima
35	2022	Sōta Fujii	4-2	Akihito Hirose
36	2023	Sōta Fujii	4-0	Takumi Itō
37	2024	Sōta Fujii	4-2	Yūki Sasaki
38	2025	Sōta Fujii	4-0	Yūki Sasaki

Records

Most titles overall: Akira Watanabe, 11
Most consecutive titles: Akira Watanabe, 9 in a row
Most times recapturing title: Yoshiharu Habu, 4
Longest period between titles: Yoshiharu Habu, 15 years
Oldest person to win title: Yoshiharu Habu, 47 years and 2 months
Youngest person to win title: Yoshiharu Habu, 19 years and 2 months.

Games played outside Japan

The first game of each of the following Ryūō title matches was played outside of Japan.

29th Ryūō challenger controversy

Hiroyuki Miura won the three-game challenger playoff match for the 29th Ryūō tournament by defeating Tadahisa Maruyama two games to one in early September 2016. Three days before Miura was to begin play against reigning Ryūō Akira Watanabe, however, the Japan Shogi Association announced that Maruyama was replacing Miura as the challenger. The official reason given by the JSA had to do with Miura failing to follow proper procedure in requesting to be allowed to withdraw from the match, but there also had been suspicions raised about Miura's recent frequent leaving of his seat during official shogi games. Suspicions had been raised that he was doing so to consult shogi software or an app installed on a smartphone. Miura denied the accusations at a meeting of the JSA managing directors on October 11, and said he was withdrawing from the upcoming title match because he could not play shogi under such circumstances. The JSA said that Miura failed to submit an official notification of withdrawal by the required deadline on October 12 and as a result Miura was suspended from official game play until December 31, 2016.
The JSA subsequently established an independent investigative panel at the end of October 2016 to determine whether Miura had actually done anything wrong and to evaluate the appropriateness of its response to the allegations. The panel held a press conference on December 26, 2016 to announce its findings. The panel found there was insufficient evidence to support the accusations of cheating made against Miura and that the claim that he had excessively left his seat during official games was false. Regarding the action taken by the JSA, the panel stated that it believed that the JSA response was appropriate given the circumstances since it had no real option other than to act the way it did. In response to the panel's report, both the JSA and Miura held separate press conferences. JSA president Koji Tanigawa apologized to Miura and announced he was being allowed to return to active status in January. Tanigawa also stated that he and three other executives of the JSA would have their salaries cut by 30% for a period of three months. Miura criticized the JSA in his press conference and stated that "he wonders why the association banned him from participating in the Ryu-oh championship match since there was no evidence of wrongdoing" and that "he wants things to be settled as soon as possible and that he will try hard to get back to his winning ways".
On January 18, 2017, Tanigawa announced that he was resigning as JSA president to assume responsibility for the JSA's handling of the matter. The following day, the resignations of Tanigawa and Akira Shima, the director in charge of the JSA's handling of the Miura allegations, were accepted at an emergency meeting of the JSA's board of directors.
On February 27, 2017, another emergency meeting of JSA professionals was held in response to a petition signed by 28 current and former professionals asking that the JSA remove five board members involved in the handling of the controversy. The meeting took place via teleconferencing at JSA offices in Tokyo and Osaka, and a vote was held to determine whether the five should be asked to step down. Out of the 234 voting members of the JSA, 216 votes were cast and a majority voted for the dismissal of three of the five: Teruichi Aono, Daisuke Nakagawa and Daisuke Katagami.
On May 24, 2017, Miura and new JSA president Yasumitsu Satō held a joint press conference to announce that a settlement had been reached to resolve any outstanding issues between the two sides. Both sides acknowledged their acceptance of the findings in the independent investigative panel's report and expressed their desire to move on from the matter. It was also announced that the JSA agreed to pay Miura an undisclosed financial settlement to compensate him for not only lost game fees, but also for the mental anguish and damage caused to his reputation. Miura also announced that he met with Ryūō title holder Watanabe prior to the press conference and that he accepted Watanabe's apology for his role in the controversy.

Players by Ryūō class

Below is a list of professional players grouped by their class for the 38th Ryūō league including their dan ranking. In addition to the regular professional players, four women's professionals, two apprentice professional 3-dans, and four amateur players also were assigned to Class 6. Women's professional ranks are denoted by a "W" before a player's dan ranking.