Luca Protopopescu is a young French chess prodigy born in 2016. Vice-U8 Europe champion in 2023, ranked number one in the world for under-8s, under-9s and then under-10s, in April 2025, he became the youngest player in chess history to surpass the 2200 Elo point threshold at the age of 9 years and 5 days (notably after beating his former coach, international master Guillaume Philippe, at the Hyères tournament in February 2025, and winning the B tournament at the Cannes International Open), beating the previous record set by England's Ethan Pang in 2024 at the age of 9 years and 103 days.
He has been a member of the club Marseille-Échecs of the French Chess Federation since the age of 4, shortly after learning the rules of the game in March 2020 during the first Covid-19 pandemic lockdown.
He was French champion in the under-8 age group in 2024, and he is the current under-10 French champion age group since May 2025.
Since September 2024, he has been coached at his club by Turkish grandmaster Mert Erdoğdu.
At the beginning of March 2025, he created a surprise by winning the B tournament (reserved for players under 2200 Elo) at the Cannes International Open. Since the end of March 2025, he has been sponsored by Turkish entrepreneur Evren Üçok, co-founder of Trendyol.