The 12th and final day of the US Chess Championship 2026 in Saint Louis has concluded. After 11 rounds, Wesley So and Fabiano Caruana finished tied at the top with 7 points each. The first Rapid game ended in a draw in the playoff. Wesley defeated Caruana in the second playoff game and won the tournament.

Wesley So won $56,000 for the victory in the event. Wesley won his 4th US Chess Championship. So stopped Fabiano Caruana’s streak of four consecutive US Championship titles.

The final standings are:

Place Player Score Prize
1. 🇺🇸 GM Wesley So 7 (+1.5) $56,000
2. 🇺🇸 GM Fabiano Caruana 7 (+0.5) $43,000
3. 🇺🇸 GM Grigoriy Oparin 6.5 $35,000
4. 🇺🇸 GM Jeffery Xiong 6.5 $25,000
5. 🇺🇸 GM Andy Woodward 6 $20,000
6. 🇺🇸 GM Abhimanyu Mishra 5.5 $14,000
7. 🇺🇸 GM Levon Aronian 5.5 $11,000
8. 🇺🇸 GM Awonder Liang 5.5 $10,000
9. 🇺🇸 GM Sam Shankland 5 $9,000
10. 🇺🇸 GM Hans Moke Niemann 4 $8,000
11. 🇺🇸 GM Ray Robson 4 $7,000
12. 🇺🇸 GM Sam Sevian 3.5 $6,000

The US Chess Championship 2026 took place from October 9 to 22, at the Saint Louis Chess Club in Missouri, USA. The event featured a 90+30 time control for the first 40 moves and 30+30 for the rest of the game over one Round-Robin between 12 players.

Credit: Lennart Ootes