Key figures
- The Sicilian Defense was played 732 times, more than twice as often as any other opening on the chart.
- The Queen’s Gambit Declined (356) and the English Opening (306) are second and third.
- The Caro-Kann Defense (271) and the Ruy López (226) complete the top five.
- The last eight openings on the chart, from the Alapin Sicilian (66) to the King’s Indian Attack (50), were each played 50 to 66 times.
All figures are from the graphic, which does not name its data source.
Chess openings ranked by frequency at the 2024 Chess Olympiad
Title: TOP 20 Openings, Chess Olympiad 2024. The chart is a horizontal bar chart on a dark background, with the horizontal axis labelled Frequency (0 to 800). The rank numbers below are ours; the chart shows the order only.
| Rank | Opening | Frequency |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | Sicilian Defense | 732 |
| 2 | Queen’s Gambit Declined | 356 |
| 3 | English Opening | 306 |
| 4 | Caro-Kann Defense | 271 |
| 5 | Ruy López Opening | 226 |
| 6 | French Defense | 177 |
| 7 | King’s Indian Defense | 174 |
| 8 | Indian Game | 166 |
| 9 | Queen’s Pawn Opening | 152 |
| 10 | Giuoco Piano Game | 125 |
| 11 | Slav Defense | 106 |
| 12 | Nimzo-Indian Defense | 95 |
| 13 | Alapin Sicilian Defense | 66 |
| 14 | Catalan Opening | 64 |
| 15 | Closed Sicilian Defense | 58 |
| 16 | London System | 57 |
| 17 | Italian Game | 56 |
| 18 | Pirc Defense | 52 |
| 19 | Scandinavian Defense | 51 |
| 20 | King’s Indian Attack | 50 |
About the 2024 Chess Olympiad
The 45th Chess Olympiad was organised by FIDE in Budapest, Hungary, from 10 to 22 September 2024. It had an Open event and a Women’s event, with 197 teams from 194 nations in the Open section and 183 teams from 180 nations in the Women’s section, and 1,884 players in total [1]. India won gold in both the Open and Women’s events, taking the Open title with 21 of a possible 22 match points, a record for the event [1].
The chart counts how often each opening appeared in games from the event. It does not show results, so it says which openings were popular at the Olympiad, not which ones scored best.
Why the Sicilian leads, and why some lines overlap
The Sicilian Defence begins 1.e4 c5 and is one of the most popular replies to White’s first move 1.e4 [2]. On the chart it appears three times: the main entry (732), the Alapin Sicilian (66) and the Closed Sicilian (58). Added together that is 856 games, about a quarter of the 3,340 games the 20 bars add up to (our arithmetic).
The Giuoco Piano (125) and the Italian Game (56) also overlap. Wikipedia notes that the term Italian Game was originally synonymous with Giuoco Piano, and that the Giuoco Piano is the line 3…Bc5 within the Italian Game [3]. Broad labels such as Indian Game and Queen’s Pawn Opening suggest the openings were grouped by automatic classification, so some games may sit under a general name rather than a specific line.
Notes on this infographic
- The graphic gives no data source, no creator and no total number of games, so we could not check the counts.
- Opening names use US spelling (Defense) as on the chart; the standard British spelling is Defence.
- Sicilian lines and Italian Game lines are counted as separate bars (see above).
- The 20 bars add up to 3,340 games (our arithmetic); games with other openings are not shown.
Sources
- Wikipedia, 45th Chess Olympiad.
- Wikipedia, Sicilian Defence.
- Wikipedia, Italian Game.
Last reviewed 30 October 2026
