Who the bleep cares? Engines know nothing when it comes to opening moves. All engines are good for is calculating forcing lines at lightning speed. While it takes you 35 minutes to figure out that 1...Kh7 forces the win of White's a2 pawn in 11 moves, it takes artificial intelligence a thousandth of a second to figure it out!
What is the best opening move according to engines?
The only engines I would look to for studying openings are Alpha Zero and Lela.
Alpha Zero does have interesting play against the French Defense.
The only engines I would look to for studying openings are Alpha Zero and Lela.
Alpha Zero does have interesting play against the French Defense.
How does it play against the French? The French has been annoying for me (when I'm White), so I'm interested.
1.d4 is the best opening objectively. In practice, anything that leads to a playable position is fine for both the best humans and engines at this time.
Well, d4 is the best choice by current Leela, which is approx 5x bigger Neural Network than Alpha Zero in 2017.

1.d4 is the best opening objectively. In practice, anything that leads to a playable position is fine for both the best humans and engines at this time.
Well, d4 is the best choice by current Leela, which is approx 5x bigger Neural Network than Alpha Zero in 2017.
Does that mean Leela is stronger than AlphaZero?
Rock, while Alpha Zero has played some very interesting games and openings in defeating the French--the ideas are very advanced and sometimes Alpha Zero makes a long term sacrifice of a pawn or more --all this is way too complicated and advanced for the average player.
I played 1. e4 for decades often hoping for the Ponziani Opening which I would practically always win.
Also, before I learned the Ponziani I won from a grand master in the US Open with 1. e4
Of course we would usually receive the continuation of 1. e4 c5 , By "we" I mean a super strong vote chess team I am on.
But the team likes 1. d4 as their main opening now and I have learned a whole lot about
1. d4 and now in my own mind find 1. d4 superior in practical chances than 1. e4.
e4 is the best
WRONG. 1 d4 is