Theodor Nissl (* 21 January 1878 in Freising; † 16 February 1972 in Bad Neustadt) was a German chess composer.

Nissl's life
Nissl worked as a secondary school teacher of mathematics and physics from 1904 to 1906 and from 1908 to 1920 in Kaiserslautern and Frankenthal, in between in Munich and Passau.There he met Ernst Krieger, who became his problem chess teacher. Nissl's first chess problems appeared shortly before World War I. Through his correspondence with several chess friends, including Johannes Kohtz and Carl Kockelkorn, Nissl became a representative of the new German school of chess composition. Nissl remained particularly close friends with Franz Sackmann, who died of influenza in 1927.

The Nissl theme named after him is: A captured piece is re-created by transformation. In recent times, however, the phoenix theme has become more popular.

Nissl met his future wife in Kaiserslautern. He worked in Weißenburg from 1920. Nissl died in a retirement home at the age of 94.