The Grand Chess Tour has crowned an overall champion every season since 2015 — one player who out-scored the field across a year of classical and rapid/blitz events. Below is the complete list of Grand Chess Tour winners by season, from Magnus Carlsen in the inaugural year to Fabiano Caruana, the reigning champion as of July 2026. Want the format and the latest-season story first? Start at the Grand Chess Tour hub.
How the champion is decided: the Tour isn’t one event — it’s a series. Players collect tour points based on where they finish at each leg, and the totals are added up across the whole season. In most years the player with the most points is simply the champion; in the seasons with a knockout Finals (2018, 2019, and again in 2025), the top point-scorers play off to settle it. That’s why the winners below are a mix of dominant season-long runs and clutch Finals victories.
The complete list of Grand Chess Tour champions
| Season | Overall Champion | Country | Notes |
|---|---|---|---|
| 2015 | Magnus Carlsen | Norway | Inaugural season (three classical legs) |
| 2016 | Wesley So | USA | Won both the Sinquefield Cup & London Chess Classic |
| 2017 | Magnus Carlsen | Norway | Second title |
| 2018 | Hikaru Nakamura | USA | Won the London GCT Finals over Vachier-Lagrave |
| 2019 | Ding Liren | China | Won the London GCT Finals; first Chinese champion |
| 2020 | — season cancelled — | — | COVID-19 pandemic |
| 2021 | Wesley So | USA | Second title |
| 2022 | Alireza Firouzja | France | Youngest overall champion (19) |
| 2023 | Fabiano Caruana | USA | Record points haul; St. Louis sweep |
| 2024 | Alireza Firouzja | France | Second title |
| 2025 | Fabiano Caruana | USA | Won the São Paulo Finals; second title |
Records & milestones
- Most overall titles: a four-way tie at two each — Magnus Carlsen (2015, 2017), Wesley So (2016, 2021), Alireza Firouzja (2022, 2024), and Fabiano Caruana (2023, 2025). No one has yet won three.
- First champion: Magnus Carlsen, who took the inaugural 2015 Tour.
- Youngest champion: Alireza Firouzja, who won the 2022 Tour at 19.
- Reigning champion: Fabiano Caruana, the 2025 winner (as of July 2026).
- Most successful nation: the United States, with five overall titles across So (×2), Nakamura, and Caruana (×2).
- Only cancelled season: 2020, called off during the COVID-19 pandemic.
A few notable results
- 2016 — Wesley So’s double. So won both classical legs — the Sinquefield Cup and the London Chess Classic — to take the Tour in only his second season on the circuit, announcing himself as a genuine world-elite player.
- 2018 — Nakamura in London. With the London Chess Classic reformatted as a four-player knockout Finals, Hikaru Nakamura beat Maxime Vachier-Lagrave to lift his first Grand Chess Tour trophy.
- 2019 — Ding makes history. Ding Liren won the London Finals to become the first Chinese player to win the Grand Chess Tour, edging a season in which Carlsen had been almost untouchable in the individual events.
- 2022 — Firouzja’s charge. Down going into the St. Louis stretch, Firouzja swept the Saint Louis Rapid & Blitz and the Sinquefield Cup back-to-back to grab the title — a stunning finish from the teenager.
- 2023 — Caruana’s record. Caruana swept the St. Louis double-header and posted one of the largest point totals in Tour history for his first overall crown.
- 2025 — the Finals return. For the first time since 2019, the season ended with a knockout Finals — in São Paulo — where Caruana beat Vachier-Lagrave 15–13 to seal his second title.
The two-title club
The most striking thing about the winners list is how tightly it’s shared. Eleven seasons have produced six different champions, and the top of the honour roll is a four-way tie: Carlsen, So, Firouzja, and Caruana each have exactly two titles. Their eras rhyme, too — Carlsen bookended the early classical years (2015, 2017), So won on either side of the pandemic gap (2016, 2021), and the most recent decade has become a Firouzja–Caruana back-and-forth (2022, 2023, 2024, 2025), with the trophy changing hands every single year. Nobody has managed to go back-to-back and then land a third, which is part of what keeps the standings race so open each season.
There’s a national story here as well. American players have been the backbone of the Tour, combining for five overall titles, while France (through Firouzja) has two, Norway (Carlsen) two, and China (Ding Liren) one. The Saint Louis events at the heart of the circuit have often proved decisive — several champions, including So, Firouzja, and Caruana, effectively sealed their titles during the St. Louis stretch of the season.
Frequently asked questions
Who has won the Grand Chess Tour the most times? Four players share the record with two titles each: Magnus Carlsen, Wesley So, Alireza Firouzja, and Fabiano Caruana.
Who won the very first Grand Chess Tour? Magnus Carlsen, in the inaugural 2015 season.
Who is the youngest Grand Chess Tour champion? Alireza Firouzja, who won the 2022 Tour at 19.
Who is the current Grand Chess Tour champion? Fabiano Caruana of the United States, who won the 2025 Tour (as of July 2026).
Was there ever a season without a champion? Yes — the 2020 season was cancelled because of the COVID-19 pandemic, so no overall champion was crowned that year.
Explore more
Learn how the circuit works and read the latest season’s story on the Grand Chess Tour hub · Dig into the Tour’s classical flagship, the Sinquefield Cup · Browse the whole events hub.
Researched and fact-checked by the Chess Lab Academy Editorial Team · Verified against grandchesstour.org, Wikipedia, and Chess.com · Champions and records current as of July 2026 · Last verified 2026-07-11 · How we verify content.