World Chess Championship 2018

The World Chess Championship 2018 is an upcoming chess match between the reigning World Chess Champion, Magnus Carlsen, and a challenger to determine the World Chess Champion. It will be held under the auspices of FIDE, the world chess federation, with the organisation rights belonging to Agon, its commercial partner.

The 12-game match is planned to take place in the last quarter of 2018.

Candidates Tournament

The challenger will be the winner of a Candidates Tournament with eight players. The World Chess Candidates will take place in Berlin, Germany, on March 10–28, 2018.

Qualification path	Player	Age	Rating	Rank
The loser of the 2016 World Championship match.	Sergey Karjakin	28
The top two finishers in the Chess World Cup 2017 who do not qualify from the 2016 match.
The top two finishers in the FIDE Grand Prix 2017 who do not qualify from the 2016 match or the World Cup.
The top two players with the highest rating (by the average of all 12 lists in 2017), who do not qualify via one of the above, and who have played in either World Cup or Grand Prix.
Wild card nomination of the organizers (Agon). Must be rated at least 2725 in any FIDE published rating list in 2017.

Reserves: The first reserve is the next highest placed player in the Grand Prix. Any further reserves are the next highest players by their average of the 2017 ratings lists.

Remaining players in the Chess World Cup

The two finalists of the Chess World Cup 2017 qualify. In the top half, Bu Xiangzhi, Peter Svidler, Maxime Vachier-Lagrave, Alexander Grischuk, Vassily Ivanchuk, and Levon Aronian remain in contention. In the bottom half, Wesley So, Baadur Jobava, Vladimir Fedoseev, Maxim Rodshtein, Evgeniy Najer, Richárd Rapport, and Ding Liren remain in contention.

Leading players in FIDE Grand Prix

After three out of four rounds of the FIDE Grand Prix 2017, five players have a mathematical chance of finishing in the top two, and gaining automatic entry to the 2018 Candidates Tournament. Three more have a mathematical chance of finishing third or fourth, and qualifying if one or both of the top two qualify via the World Cup. A maximum of 170 points is available in the final round of the Grand Prix. The Chess World Cup is being played in September 2017, before the final Grand Prix round in November 2017.

Rank	Player	GrandPrix Points	Tournaments played (out of 3)
1	Shakhriyar Mamedyarov	340	3
2	Alexander Grischuk	336${\tfrac {3}{7}}$	3
3	Teimour Radjabov	241${\tfrac {3}{7}}$	2
4	Ding Liren	240	2
5	Maxime Vachier-Lagrave	211${\tfrac {3}{7}}$	2
7	Hikaru Nakamura	141${\tfrac {3}{7}}$	2
9=	Peter Svidler	131${\tfrac {3}{7}}$	2
9=	Anish Giri	131${\tfrac {3}{7}}$	2

Leading players by average rating of 2017

The following are the top players by average rating of 2017, assuming no change of rating for the rest of the year. This ranking uses the 9 rating lists from January to September, and uses the September ratings as placeholders for the remaining months, since players' ratings remain constant if they do not play. The list excludes Magnus Carlsen (current world champion) and Sergey Karjakin (already qualified for Candidates Tournament 2018).

Rank	Player	Average Rating	Ratings in each month to date	Can player qualify for higher priority spot?
1	Fabiano Caruana	2809.00	2827, 2827, 2817, 2817, 2802, 2808, 2807, 2807, 2799, (2799), (2799), (2799)	No
2	Vladimir Kramnik	2807.50	2811, 2811, 2811, 2811, 2811, 2808, 2812, 2803, 2803, (2803), (2803), (2803)	No
3	Wesley So	2807.42	2808, 2822, 2822, 2822, 2815, 2812, 2810, 2810, 2792, (2792), (2792), (2792)	World Cup
4	Maxime Vachier-Lagrave	2798.75	2796, 2796, 2803, 2803, 2795, 2796, 2791, 2789, 2804, (2804), (2804), (2804)	World Cup and Grand Prix
5	Levon Aronian	2792.58	2780, 2785, 2774, 2774, 2789, 2793, 2809, 2799, 2802, (2802), (2802), (2802)	World Cup
6	Viswanathan Anand	2788.17	2786, 2786, 2786, 2786, 2786, 2786, 2783, 2783, 2794, (2794), (2794), (2794)	No
7	Hikaru Nakamura	2786.25	2785, 2785, 2793, 2793, 2786, 2785, 2792, 2792, 2781, (2781), (2781), (2781)	Grand Prix (only if Grischuk qualifies via World Cup)

Table remarks

• The 2017 Chess World Cup is the only major tournament that will apply for the October 2017 rating. Most likely Caruana's (2794), Kramnik's (2794), Anand's (2783) and Nakamura's (2774) live ratings shall be their October rating. Kramnik and Nakamura will play in the Isle of Man Open from 23 September to 1 October, which will count for their November rating.
• Remaining major tournaments for 2017:
  • Isle of Man Open (all but Aronian depending on World Cup performance)
  • European Chess Club Cup
  • European Team Chess Championship
  • 4th FIDE Grand Prix 2017 tournament (Vachier-Lagrave and Nakamura)

Championship match

Organization and location

The match will be held under the auspices of FIDE, the world chess federation, with the organisation rights belonging to Agon, its commercial partner. After the World Chess Championship Match 2016 FIDE was reported to announce an Asian venue for the match during the presidential council in spring 2017. Japan, Singapore, South Korea and London were announced to be the host candidates. However on 7 June 2017 Agon published a press statement that Norwegian Chess Federation has submitted an application to host the 2018 World Chess Championship in Oslo, pending confirmation of funding from the government sources. However, after funds have not been secured in time, it has been decided by World Chess in agreement with the Norwegian Chess Federation to terminate the 2018 application process. The Norwegian Chess Federation will consider putting an application for the 2020 World Chess Championship. The city that will host the 2018 World Chess Championship Match was scheduled to be announced in June 2017.

External links

• Unofficial list of qualifiers for candidates tournament