But, what if?

That’s the question you are about to explore. After winning Leg 1 in Berlin, we know that Hikaru Nakamura is the most likely to qualify for the Candidates Tournament from the Grand Prix. But how likely is he to qualify if he lands on 20 points? 94%. In order to guarantee qualification, he will need to get 2nd or better in the 3rd leg. That said, in many scenarios where he doesn’t even win his pool he still qualifies.

In the charts below, you can explore all potential qualification outcomes for every player. Curious how likely Anish Giri is to qualify if he scores 17? Can Daniil Dubov qualify if he wins leg 3? Take a look. The data is based on 500,000 simulations.

As the tournaments unfolds I will be updating this page regularly. Each player may find interesting what needs to be accomplished in order to achieve qualification. Is it worth fighting for a win with the black pieces to get to the knockout stage, or is it better to play it safe and take a draw, securing a particular spot in the pool? The intricacicies of final standings in tournament chess can be difficult to estimate intuitively - this tool is fun for us fans to look at, but could also be useful to the players as well!

Possibilities for Qualification into Candidates Tournament
Last updated February 24, 2022 12:00 AM PT GMT-8

Overall odds of qualifying for the Candidates Tournament

Name Qualify % ELO
Hikaru Nakamura 52.1 2750
Levon Aronian 35.8 2785
Anish Giri 21.9 2771
Shakhriyar Mamedyarov 20.6 2776
Maxime Vachier-Lagrave 14.9 2761
Wesley So 14.0 2778
Richárd Rapport 11.5 2762
Leinier Domínguez 10.0 2756
Dmitry Andreikin 4.4 2724
Nikita Vitiugov 3.9 2726
Yu Yangyi 3.4 2713
Alexander Grischuk 2.6 2758
Sam Shankland 1.5 2704
Daniil Dubov 1.1 2711
Vidit Gujrathi 0.8 2723
Vladimir Fedoseev 0.5 2704
Alexandr Predke 0.4 2682
Pentala Harikrishna 0.4 2716
Amin Tabatabae 0.0 2623
Alexei Shirov 0.0 2704
Grigoriy Oparin 0.0 2681
Étienne Bacrot 0.0 2642
Vincent Keymer 0.0 2664