During a Twitch stream, xQc was granted the title of Grandmaster while playing online blitz matches on chess.com. The promotion was quite shocking as the coveted "GM" rank is only held by an elite few. On that note, xQc was only sitting at a 589 rating, typical for chess beginners. For perspective, actual chess Grandmaster Hikaru Nakamura has a 3214 blitz ranking – currently number 1 on the leaderboards.
Overall, the chess community has proven that they are more than ready to deal with the new attention that Twitch has driven the sport. The streamer's sudden promotion was likely a lighthearted prank set up by chess.com admins, especially considering that xQc is fairly new to the sport and only playing for fun. Additionally, chess.com even added xQc to their list of Grandmasters on a separate page – only to be eventually removed after the fun died down.
Certain chess personalities emerged as vocal opponents to the recent attention Hikaru and xQc generated through their collaboration. Nevertheless, many of these "chess elitists" have come around. Ben Finegold recently made amends for his earlier insults, apologizing to xQc fans and showing some respectable sportsmanship. Oh, and the powerhouse known as Magnus Carlsen is starting to warm up to the platform.