The Candidates Tournaments occupy a central place in the chess calendar, as it determines the challengers for the next World Chess Championships - in the open and women's circuits.
With only a small, elite field competing over a demanding round-robin format, every encounter carries considerable weight, and familiarity between players often plays a role. Examining head-to-head records offers a useful way to contextualise these rivalries ahead of such a decisive event.
The focus here is placed on the direct records between participants, highlighting how individual matchups have developed over time. These statistics can reveal patterns that are not immediately apparent from ratings or recent form alone.
To compile these figures efficiently, the data has been sourced using Mega Database 2026, the leading reference tool for players of all levels. With over 11.7 million games spanning from 1475 to 2026 and more than 114,000 annotated encounters, it offers a comprehensive and reliable foundation for statistical work of this kind.
In each pairing, stats have been separated in 1) classical encounters and 2) all encounters, which include rapid, blitz and chess960 games, played over the board or online.
The premiere chess database with over 11.7 million games
The ChessBase Mega Database 2026 is the premiere chess database with over 11.7 million games from 1475 to 2025 in high quality.
Open - Round four
- In their one official classical encounter, Fabiano Caruana and Javokhir Sindarov drew their game in 31 moves at the 2023 FIDE Grand Swiss. They also have a level score in overall confrontations, with two wins for each player.
- Wei Yi and Hikaru Nakamura have drawn all four of their classical encounters. The last one was played last year at the Norway Chess super-tournament.
- There are only two games recorded overall, both in classical chess, between Matthias Bluebaum and Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu. Bluebaum beat Pragg with white at the 2025 FIDE Grand Swiss, and his other encounter ended drawn.
- There is no record of Anish Giri ever losing a game against Andrey Esipenko.
Javokhir Sindarov v. Fabiano Caruana
All confrontations
Wei Yi v. Hikaru Nakamura
All confrontations
Matthias Bluebaum v. Praggnanandhaa Rameshbabu
Classical chess confrontations
Andrey Esipenko v. Anish Giri
Classical chess confrontations
Women's - Round four
- Anna Muzychuk and Kateryna Lagno have been facing each other since 1997 (in official games - perhaps even earlier, while growing up in Ukraine). Muzychuk has a small edge in their classical encounters.
- Bibisara Assaubayeva and Tan Zhongyi have quite a balanced head-to-head record.
- Zhu Jiner has a very good record against Divya Deshmukh. However, the Indian grandmaster knocked out her Chinese colleague on her way to winning the Women's World Cup last year.
- Surprisingly, Vaishali Rameshbabu has a plus score against Aleksandra Goryachkina both in classical chess and in their games across all formats - the Russian GM has been consistently higher rated than her round-four opponent.
Anna Muzychuk v. Kateryna Lagno
Classical chess confrontations
Bibisara Assaubayeva v. Tan Zhongyi
All confrontations
Divya Deshmukh v. Zhu Jiner
All confrontations
Vaishali Rameshbabu v. Aleksandra Goryachkina
All confrontations
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