My brother has the best record: 100%
He won one game against the computer on super low level and never played chess again.
Who has the best win/draw/loss record?
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I would guess Philidor, Morphy, or Capablanca. Sorry, but I don't have any solid facts to back that up, though I'm pretty sure it's one of those three.
In my Chessbase database, Morphy has by far the best record
Total games: 297; + 219, =27, -51
Capablanca:
Total games: 647; +328, = 264, - 55
In terms of record is not the most accurate measure of skill, the average chess player in modern day is far stronger than the average player 100 years ago. Chess has evolved, and continues to evolve.
I totally agree with you...and that is why I said "closer to knowing"...we will never really know...hey, modern players benefit from modern technology, new methods of training, computers etc...none of which was around for older players...if those old guys had what we have today...I'm sure they would have been even better than they were then...don't you think so?
Morphy has an 84.6 percent and you can look it up on chessgames.com. Just search up "The Chess Games of Paul Morphy" on the internet and it says Paul Morphy has 196 wins, 24 draws, 26 losses.
Using career percentage to decide who has been the greatest player, as suggested by the OP, is impossible. Vachier-Lagrave has 65.1, Nakamura 62.8, Giri 61.8, and Carlsen 61.5, but this doesn't mean that those four players can be ranked in that order. Those numbers simply mean very little, for example Carlsen has only played top events since he was very young, so world ranking and rating says much more than percentage.
There are always going to be so many factors that go into a GM's record. Who did he play? When did he play them? At the height of their career? At the height of his career? How many of his games were against the toughest opposition and how many against weaker opponents? The thing about playing strength is that it is much like IQ or the rating system. It's relative. The only way you could possibly find out who was the best would be to defy the laws of time and have them all play a bunch of round-robin games when they are/were all at their prime and all other non-player specific conditions being equal. Boy would I LOVE to see the results of something like THAT! One small caveat I would like to add... Capablanca probably studied chess the least of any GM of all time, yet is still one of the greatest. If he had put in the same effort that Alekhine had in preparing for tournaments, is there any doubt that Capablanca would have defended his title against Alekhine or just about anyone else for that matter? I think he would have been the greatest even to today. But I'm sure we all know: "shoulda, coulda, woulda..."
The late Claude Bloodgood had a great Win/Draw/Loss record.
He was a convicted murderer who was locked up for life in Virginia.
Per chessgames.com "In 1996 he was the 2nd highest USCF ranked player in the country (2702), just behind Gata Kamsky. His actual strength was almost certainly much less, as he is believed to have exploited the rating system by organizing chess tournaments and matches in prison against opponents who could easily be bribed, manipulated, and were at any rate far from top-level competition. From 1993 to 1999, he played 3,174 rated chess games, winning over 91 percent of them."
Arcturus10 wrote:
capablankamonte has a really good record on this site.
For all time OTB players, I think Capablanka had the best record. He played like a computer compared to other chess players of his time. I think he is widely accepted to have been better than Kasparov and Fischer besides his record and rating.
LOOL
It is only fair to rank players in their own time. In their own time Emanuel Lasker and Gary Kasparov have the highest winning percentage, both over 73%. No one else comes even close.
This forum was created in 2010. It has been bumped in 2014, 2021, and now in 2024.
(Sorry, I just like numbers. 
)
"Who is the best?"...is always a hot topic...was it Kasparov? Fischer? Karpov?
Hey...I've seen this question before...but everyone gave their personal "feelings"...what I'm really interested in finding out is which player in history had the best statistical record...I think this data should bring us closer to knowing who was really the best of all time.