Top 20 players of 2018: Introduction

With the start of January, we will begin revealing the players that made HLTV.org's Top 20 players of the year list, powered by EGB.com. As we did in the previous seven iterations, we will bring stories about their performance over the last 12 months and explain why they earned their spot among the elite.

The Top 20 players of 2018 list will be revealed over the next twenty days as we will announce one player per day up until January 18, with the winner and the runner-up being revealed simultaneously on January 20. The announcement of every player will be accompanied with an in-depth article covering the player's history, his showings this year, and of course, his bold prediction for 2019.

The list will be updated right here every time a player is revealed, and you will be able to find the full ranking once it's all over.

Top 20 players of 2018 powered by EGB.com:

1. Aleksandr "s1mple" Kostyliev
2. Nicolai "device" Reedtz
3. Nikola "NiKo" Kovac
4. Denis "electronic" Sharipov
5. Peter "dupreeh" Rasmussen
6. Keith "NAF" Markovic
7. Emil "Magisk" Reif
8. Lukas "gla1ve" Rossander
9. Freddy "KRIMZ" Johansson
10. Marcelo "coldzera" David
11. Ladislav "GuardiaN" Kovács
12. Russel "Twistzz" Van Dulken
13. Andreas "Xyp9x" Højsleth
14. Tomáš "oskar" Štastný
15. Jonathan "EliGE" Jablonowski
16. Miikka "suNny" Kemppi
17. Timothy "autimatic" Ta
18. Håvard "rain" Nygaard
19. Robin "ropz" Kool
20. Valdemar "valde" Bjørn Vangså

As CS:GO continues to grow in terms of tournaments, 2018 featured even more Big Events than 2017, a total of 21. Adding a plethora of medium and small events to that, it was once again difficult to filter down to the 20 best players of the year, as well as order the best correctly.

See the latest CSGO betting sites.

As this is a list of top performers over the year, putting up MVP-worthy displays has always been a way for players to stand out, which we recognized by selecting the MVP (who earned a medal) and a few EVPs (Exceptionally Valuable Players) of each noteworthy event and included that in our analysis process.

We continue to use individual statistics as a base for our ranking, thus only considering a player's measurable impact inside the server. In addition to the MVP and EVP recognitions, the ranking considers various parameters, such as how much damage players dealt, how much impact they made with multi-kills, opening frags or clutches, how consistent they were and how they performed in big playoff series and at the biggest events.

To those looking for clues, we can say that eight players make their first-ever appearance in our top 20 selection and that there was only one non-Major event this year with all of our 20 picks in attendance.

In case you're new to the series or you forgot who the stars of years past were, you can check out our previous editions here (2012 was not covered as it was a transitional year between CS 1.6 and CS:GO):

Top 20 players of 2017 (CS:GO)
Top 20 players of 2016 (CS:GO)
Top 20 players of 2015 (CS:GO)
Top 20 players of 2014 (CS:GO)
Top 20 players of 2013 (CS:GO)
Top 20 players of 2011 (CS 1.6)
Top 20 players of 2010 (CS 1.6)