2026 British Open snooker tournament preview: Who'll be champion in Cheltenham?

After a summer of behind-closed-doors qualifying and Championship League action in the UK, followed by a big triple-header of tournaments in China, televised snooker returns to UK shores again with the 2026 British Open.

Since Jak Jones' Championship League title victory in mid-July, three more trophies have been lifted in recent weeks. Judd Trump claimed his second Shanghai Masters invitational crown in three years, Mark Selby was the last cueist standing at the revived China Open - securing that accolade for a record fourth time - and in recent days, Chang Bingyu became the 83rd player to win a ranking title when he was triumphant at the Wuhan Open.

Having spent 17 years away from snooker's top-flight, the British Open was resurrected in 2021 and has remained on the circuit since.

The tournament is rebuilding its brand nicely, maintaining pretty much the same spot on the calendar each year, and seems to have found a new home at The Centaur in Cheltenham, with the venue set to host for a fourth consecutive edition.

For fans in the UK, there will be a change this time, though, with host broadcaster Channel 5 taking over the reigns from ITV4.

The FA Cup of Snooker

One of the ways the British Open stands out is that it uses an ‘FA Cup-style’ random draw for each round.

All 128 entrants start in the opening round - unlike the tiered system used for most events on the World Snooker Tour these days - and anyone can draw anyone at any stage. This is a throwback to how the tournament used to be run decades ago.

Despite this unpredictability, though, in its modern era, the cream has always risen to the top at the British Open.

Since its revival in 2021, the title has always been claimed by a multiple-time ranking event winner - three of those being former World Champions. The only finalist during that time who wasn't a multiple-time ranking event champion was Gary Wilson in 2021, although it wouldn't be too long until he was one himself.

All the top 16 players who entered this year's staging have avoided each other in round one, although there could be a couple of elite encounters in the last 64 with potential for defending champion Shaun Murphy v three-time winner Mark Williams, and reigning World Champion Wu Yize v current Masters Champion Kyren Wilson.

Short matches also add to the jeopardy of the event with best of seven frames fixtures up to and including the last 16.

Who is playing at the 2026 British Open snooker?

All the world's top 16 players entered this year's British Open, but Mark Allen (personal reasons) and Ronnie O'Sullivan (medical reasons) have recently withdrawn and been replaced with amateur top-ups.

The majority of round one matches have already been played as 'qualifiers' at the Mattioli Arena in Leicester a few weeks ago. However, all the opening round games involving top 16 stars have been held over to The Centaur, and will be played on Monday. The only exception is Zhao Xintong's tie with Oliver Brown that has understandably been pushed back to Tuesday afternoon to allow the new world number one time to travel from the Wuhan Open final he was in on Saturday.

Winner of that Wuhan Open crown, Chang Bingyu, is already through to the last 64 having whitewashed former World Champion Stuart Bingham at the qualifiers. Next up for Chang is a meeting with Chatchapong Nasa.

It will be interesting to see how the sport's top stars acclimatise back playing competitively on UK soil. The aforementioned trio of tournaments in the Far East - described as the ‘Chinese swing’ of the Tour - ran from the end of July. It’s believed that several players stayed in China all that time, some travelled back and forth.

The matches during the opening four rounds in Cheltenham are shorter than what they have recently been playing, and the prize money is less; the winners of those three Chinese events each collected £210,000, £250,000, and £175,000, respectively - the British Open winner will trouser £100,000 (of course, not to be sniffed at).

Conditions will also likely be very different in the UK to what they have recently been playing in and on. On the whole, they seemed to be quite generous at the Shanghai Masters and China Open, but appeared to be a lot more challenging at the Wuhan Open where not a great deal of century breaks were made.

Title holder Murphy - who meets 12-times World Women’s Champion Reanne Evans in round one - will be aiming to create British Open history by becoming the first player to win the title in back-to-back years.

Over the coming days, several of snooker’s biggest names will be trying to improve on some very ordinary records in the event.

Bristol’s Judd Trump - who for the first time in two years won’t be playing as the world number one - has just one quarter-final to his name, whilst world number two Neil Robertson has never been past the last 32.

From his three outings in it, Zhao has not gone further than the round of 32 either, meanwhile Crucible king Wu hasn’t breached the last 64 in his five attempts.

‘Class of 92’ members John Higgins and Mark Williams both hold proud British Open records, although they did feature in many editions during the 1990s and 2000s before it was shelved. Higgins has won the crown four times (equal with Stephen Hendry for most title wins in it) and Williams has a hat-trick to his name, with two (2021 and 2023) of those coming since its rebirth.

To view the full draw, results, schedule, and other information from the 2026 British Open snooker, visit our tournament information centre here.