Chess Opening Tier List by GM Hikaru

He rates the Bongcloud WAY too high... although that might be just a joke. More generally, he rates the Nimzo-Larsen and the Tarrasch French too high and the Scandinavian and Guioco too low.

Took another look at the list and I become more bold, his list is not good and honestly I could easily make a better one. The placement just seems like everything was on a whim, for example I consider the Berlin legendary. Actually it is not just me pretty much everyone does the Caro kann however I personally would place in solid because it absolutely is sound and good but not to the level of say the Berlin or the Najdorf. I mights put the French a teir below that because even though it likely doesn’t lose at least on a theoretical level there are some fight for draw spots. Maybe the caro and French are same tier that’s what a GM could help explain. So I would not die on that hill. But I do cut some slack because for an incredibly talented player a lot of openings that appear as one trick ponies the higher you go are hard to rate.

The fact that he gets certain obvious ones wrong bugs me though.

The Spanish, the QG, Open Sicilian legendary for white.
The Berlin, the Najdorf,, Nimzo legendary for black, really those should be clear

To put the Grand Prix at legendary when it scores 50 on a good day is odd to me but I will say that it is in his style and he is great with it. Others that are in legendary like the evans gambit, I mean yeah it’s a great gambit but it was trotted out as a surprise weapon 30 years ago not something you’ll see in cc chess. So it just seems all over the place.

Says Giuoco Piano is trash, proceeds to say that the Evans Gambit is good, when the Evans Gambit is a line of the Giuoco Piano.

im pretty sure he didnt mention traxler counterattack

 

Hikaru, not Hiraru