Individual Polish Chess Championship is the most important Polish chess tournament, aiming at selecting the best chess players in Poland. Based on the results of the tournament (mainly), the Polish Chess Federation selects the national and subsequently the olympiad team.
The first men's championship took place in 1926, and the first women's event in 1935, both in Warsaw. Between the First and the Second World War, four men's finals and two women's took place. After the Second World War, the tournament has taken part annually, with minor exceptions. In most cases, they are round-robin tournaments, where men's groups are of 14-16 players, while the women's are 12 to 14. There were only four Swiss system tournaments in men's tournament history (1975, 1976, 1977, and 1979) and seven in women's (1959, 1965, 1966, 1975, 1976, 1977, 1978). Twice (1937 men and 1962 women) final tournaments attracted international players, however in 1962 medals were awarded only to Polish women players. Twice women's championship (1960 and 1963) as the Polish crew tournament took place (it is signed by *) in the Winners table).