What is the best opening?
The February 2017 issue of Chess lists the top twenty openings compiled from a list of 4561 December games where both players were rated over 2400 Elo. One can not take position on this list too seriously because it is greatly influenced by how the openings are grouped. For example, all the Retis are grouped together, while English is separated into 1...c5, 1...e5, etc. Nevertheless, for what it is worth, some of the list entries are: 336 Retis, 198 King's Indians, 186 Caro-Kanns, 159 declined Queen's Gambits, 158 Nimzo-Indians, 148 Najdorf Sicilians, 135 Slavs, 128 1...c5 Englishes, 114 Kan Sicilians, 102 Italians, 98 1...Nf6 Englishes, 97 Queen's Indians, 88 1...e5 Englishes, and 78 Berlin Ruy Lopezes