The year he turned 12, he beat Park Ha-min and Shin Min-jun at the Korea Baduk Association’s first child prodigy entry tournament and turned pro. In 2013, he was promoted to 2 dan and reached the main draw of the Korean Baduk League for the first time. In 2014, he won his first title since turning pro, at the Mirae Poseok Yeoljeon.
In 2015, he won the Let’s Run Park Cup and became the youngest title holder in Korea’s largest tournament. In 2016, he was the only player born in the 2000s to reach the main draw of the Samsung Fire Cup. In 2017, he won the Globis Cup World U-20 in Japan and completed 200 career wins.
The breakthrough yearThe year he turned 18, he reached 9 dan (ipsin) in April, and in November he ended Park Jung-hwan’s 59 straight months at No. 1 and took the top Korean ranking for the first time. Sports Seoul nicknamed him the 21st-century kid.
The year he turned 19, he reached No. 1 in the world on the Go ranking site Go Ratings in January, and the same month lost to Ke Jie in the Bailing Cup final to finish runner-up. In April he won the Maxim Coffee Cup on his first appearance. The year he turned 20, he beat Park Jung-hwan in the LG Cup final in February for his first major world title. In August he held six titles at once for the first time since Lee Chang-ho. In 2021, he won the Myeongin Tournament for the first time and the Chunlan Cup, and took a third Baduk Awards MVP with six titles in the year. In November 2022, he won the Samsung Fire Cup as well and held three major world titles at the same time.
The year he turned 23, he beat Xie Ke in the Ing Cup final in August and gave Korea its first title in 14 years. In October he won men’s team gold at the Hangzhou Asian Games, and at the end of the year he won a fifth Baduk Awards MVP and passed 100 wins in a year for the first time.
In January 2024, he won his third LG Cup, and on his 24th birthday he played his 1,000th career game. In February 2025, he won the Nanyang Cup for his eighth major world title, and in September he regained the Myeongin Tournament after two years.
In July 2026, he beat the AI KataGo in a handicap game, and in September he stayed No. 1 in the Korean rankings for an 81st straight month and is going for Korea’s seventh straight title at the Nongshim Cup, which opened that month.
Shin Jin-seo (born Mar 17, 2000) turned pro on Jul 16, 2012, the year he turned 12, at the Korea Baduk Association’s first child prodigy entry tournament, and became known on Nov 5, 2018, the year he turned 18, when he took No. 1 in the Korean rankings. On the world stage, he won the Ing Cup World Go Championship in 2023, the year he turned 23.
Ages are by calendar year (the year minus the birth year), birthdays aside.