Reigning men and women World Champions Gukesh Dommaraju and Ju Wenjun will headline the 16 player line-up for World Championship Tour pilot tournament (“Total Chess 2026 Pilot”), the new combined competition across Fast Classic, Rapid, and Blitz.
The 2026 event is officially a pilot, testing the full concept, format, and regulations of the World Championship Tour. The inaugural full Tour season, with the official crowning of the first Total Chess World Champion, will start in 2027.
The pilot tournament is scheduled to take place from October 3–15, 2026. The host destinations/locations will be announced at a later date.
Based on the qualification criteria approved by FIDE, the list of players includes the top 13 players in the January classical rating list, the Women’s World Champion, plus additional elite qualifiers from the World Rapid and World Blitz Championships – a more than respectable lineup for the 2026 pilot.
The three medalists of the 2025 World Rapid Championship have also earned their spots including top ranked Magnus Carlsen, who will be joined by Vladislav Artemiev and Arjun Erigaisi.
The two qualifiers from the 2025 World Blitz Championship are Nodirbek Abdusattorov and Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, who qualified via the lowest average sum of placements.
Based on the classical rating list as of 1 January 2026, and applying the agreed replacement rules (to account for players already qualified via World Championships and World Rapid/Blitz), Hikaru Nakamura, Fabiano Caruana, Vincent Keymer, Anish Giri, Alireza Firouzja, Rameshbabu Praggnanandhaa and Wei Yi.
Two further places are filled according to the replacement criteria – Wesley So as the first replacement (lowest average sum of placements) and Viswanathan Anand – the first replacement according to rating.
The next two players who will earn the right to receive invitations will be decided in April 2026, following the conclusion of the FIDE Candidates Tournament and the FIDE Women’s Candidates Tournament, whose winners will also qualify for the Tour.
They will be joined by the top three players in the standard rating list (June 1, 2026), excluding those already qualified, and three FIDE Open Circuit qualifiers (special ranking, including only open events).
