Ali Carter rejoins top 16 in latest snooker rankings update

Ali Carter has risen nine places and back into the top 16 after the latest snooker rankings update was confirmed on Monday.

The Captain captured a seventh career ranking title and the £100,000 top prize for his victory over Mark Williams in the final of the 2026 English Open.

It’s a good time to be making moves in the rankings with plenty of potential rewards on the horizon.

Let’s take a look at some of the updates following the action last week in Brentwood.

Mark Williams returns to the top eight

Mark Williams was disappointed not to add to his tally of 27 ranking crowns, admitting afterwards that he would have taken a break if he had managed to pocket the champion’s cheque.

Instead, Williams will head to his defence of the Shenzhen Open – renamed and relocated from last year’s Xi’an Grand Prix – with a ranking of number eight in the world.

Zhao Xintong lost in the opening round of the English Open and took home no ranking points but remains about £150,000 clear as the world number one.

Judd Trump, Neil Robertson, and Wu Yize leapfrog Mark Selby who drops down to fifth after his points for winning the 2024 English Open were deducted from his rolling two-year sum.

John Higgins, who didn’t play last week, and Shaun Murphy remain unchanged in sixth and seventh respectively.

Where is Ali Carter ranked?

Below Williams, Kyren Wilson and Barry Hawkins complete the top ten ahead of Xiao Guodong, Chris Wakelin, Mark Allen, Ronnie O’Sullivan, and Ding Junhui.

Ali Carter, meanwhile, brings up the rear in the revised top 16 order – replacing Jack Lisowski in the elite bracket of the standings.

It could be very good timing for the Captain to return to the top 16 with just a couple of months between now and the UK Championship in York.

As usual, the top 16 will avoid the qualifiers, with Carter currently 15th on the provisional Race to the UK Championship list.

Invitations to the prestigious Masters in London will be handed out not long after.

Elsewhere, Ding had a strong week in Brentwood by reaching the semi-finals but will need much more of the same if he is to avoid dropping out of the top 16 in the coming weeks.

A little further down, Chang Bingyu moves up to a career-high ranking of 20 as he continues to benefit from not having any points to defend this term.

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Rank	Official 2-Year World Rankings	Sept 14, 2026
1	Zhao Xintong	£1,265,550
2	Judd Trump	£1,109,550
3	Neil Robertson	£1,092,200
4	Wu Yize	£1,073,900
5	Mark Selby	£1,048,150
6	John Higgins	£917,000
7	Shaun Murphy	£891,000
8	Mark J Williams	£747,400
9	Kyren Wilson	£712,300
10	Barry Hawkins	£673,800
11	Xiao Guodong	£643,900
12	Chris Wakelin	£570,200
13	Mark Allen	£540,550
14	Ronnie O’Sullivan	£513,750
15	Ding Junhui	£491,850
16	Ali Carter	£418,150
—	—	—
17	Jack Lisowski	£374,100
18	Zhou Yuelong	£359,100
19	Zhang Anda	£348,600
20	Chang Bingyu	£345,500
21	Si Jiahui	£343,000
22	Stuart Bingham	£342,300
23	Jak Jones	£327,300
24	Elliot Slessor	£324,700
25	Thepchaiya Un-Nooh	£321,600
26	Gary Wilson	£282,800
27	Pang Junxu	£272,500
28	Lei Peifan	£270,800
29	Noppon Saengkham	£250,500
30	Joe O’Connor	£245,450
31	Hossein Vafaei	£242,200
32	Stephen Maguire	£223,200

Players Ranked 33-64 (Click to expand)

Rank	Player	Sept 14, 2026
33	Yuan Sijun	£220,400
34	David Gilbert	£212,950
35	Tom Ford	£199,800
36	Jackson Page	£198,250
37	Aaron Hill	£189,100
38	Anthony McGill	£186,100
39	Stan Moody	£179,800
40	Xu Si	£176,650
41	Ryan Day	£164,250
42	Zak Surety	£163,900
43	Luca Brecel	£162,500
44	He Guoqiang	£155,800
45	Jimmy Robertson	£149,600
46	Michael Holt	£149,350
47	Matthew Selt	£148,150
48	Daniel Wells	£143,700
49	Ben Woollaston	£141,500
50	Long Zehuang	£138,850
51	Matthew Stevens	£137,500
52	Fan Zhengyi	£133,950
53	Robbie Williams	£128,850
54	Martin O’Donnell	£119,400
55	Liu Hongyu	£119,100
56	Ricky Walden	£114,350
57	Oliver Lines	£111,200
58	David Lilley	£106,100
59	Ishpreet Singh Chadha	£93,950
60	Jamie Jones	£93,650
61	Ben Mertens	£93,600
62	Lyu Haotian	£93,150
63	Jordan Brown	£92,350
64	Jiang Jun	£88,850

Players Ranked 65-96 (Click to expand)

Rank	Player	Sept 14, 2026
65	Liam Highfield	£88,800
66	Scott Donaldson	£80,750
67	Louis Heathcote	£76,300
68	Liam Pullen	£72,950
69	Dylan Emery	£68,950
70	Iulian Boiko	£68,500
71	Marco Fu	£68,150
72	Sam Craigie	£65,500
73	Steven Hallworth	£59,200
74	Gao Yang	£54,200
75	David Grace	£53,850
76	Yao Pengcheng	£51,850
77	Ian Burns	£48,700
78	Michal Szubarczyk	£38,450
79	Lan Yuhao	£37,100
80	Ross Muir	£35,500
81	Xu Yichen	£34,350
82	Liam Davies	£33,200
83	Zhao Hanyang	£28,100
84	Mateusz Baranowski	£24,500
85	Reanne Evans	£24,000
86	Liu Wenwei	£23,600
87	Artemijs Zizins	£21,600
88	Liam Graham	£20,500
89	Leone Crowley	£20,500
90	Florian Nuessle	£18,100
91	Wang Xinbo	£16,900
92	Gong Chenzhi	£16,000
93	Ashley Carty	£15,400
94	Jamie Clarke	£15,400
95	Oliver Brown	£15,000
96	Thanawat Tirapongpaiboon	£14,100

Players Ranked 97-128 (Click to expand)

Rank	Player	Sept 14, 2026
97	Chatchapong Nasa	£13,500
98	Connor Benzey	£13,000
99	Alexander Ursenbacher	£12,600
100	Mitchell Mann	£10,500
101	Sahil Nayyar	£10,500
102	Fergal Quinn	£10,000
103	Jimmy White	£9,000
104	Luo Zetao	£8,900
105	Oliver Sykes	£8,000
106	Mahmoud El Hareedy	£7,500
107	Antoni Kowalski	£7,100
108	Alfie Burden	£7,000
109	Hammad Miah	£6,500
110	Cheung Ka Wai	£6,000
111	Ng On Yee	£6,000
112	Phil O’Kane	£5,500
113	Julien Leclercq	£5,500
114	Sean O’Sullivan	£5,500
115	Ashley Hugill	£5,400
116	Liu Yang	£5,000
117	Andrew Higginson	£5,000
118	Huang Jiahao	£4,000
119	Anton Kazakov	£3,500
120	Craig Steadman	£3,500
121	Bai Yulu	£3,000
122	Deng Haohui	£2,500
123	Stuart Carrington	£2,000
124	Michael Larkov	£1,750
125	Panchaya Channoi	£0
125	Paul Norris	£0
127	Igor Figueiredo	£0
127	Mina Awad	£0

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How do the 1-year snooker rankings look?

As ever, the one-year snooker rankings will be important on various fronts – notably qualification to three big tournaments in the second half of the season.

The fields for the World Grand Prix, Players Championship, and Tour Championship have typically been comprised using these standings.

The one-year rankings can also provide an avenue back onto the main tour for lower-ranked players who fail to break into the top 64 and secure tour survival.

Carter elevates himself into the top four and is well-placed to qualify for everything on the Players Series, with Williams up to eighth.

World champion Wu Yize is currently only in 31st position, meaning he has work to do to safeguard his spot at the World Grand Prix in February.

Below the top 32 cut-off point currently lie the likes of Barry Hawkins, John Higgins, and Mark Allen – the latter having not played at all yet this season.

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Rank	1-Year Rankings	Sept 14, 2026
1	Mark Selby	£326,000
2	Chang Bingyu	£202,400
3	Jak Jones	£141,000
4	Ali Carter	£126,500
5	Noppon Saengkham	£118,500
6	Zhao Xintong	£89,000
7	Zhou Yuelong	£68,200
8	Mark J Williams	£67,000
9	David Gilbert	£65,000
10	Shaun Murphy	£57,000
11	Judd Trump	£55,200
12	Xiao Guodong	£51,000
13	Stuart Bingham	£51,000
14	Ronnie O’Sullivan	£48,000
15	Neil Robertson	£47,000
16	Zhang Anda	£44,400
17	Kyren Wilson	£42,200
18	Pang Junxu	£41,000
19	Chris Wakelin	£40,400
20	Hossein Vafaei	£34,000
21	Liam Davies	£33,200
22	Aaron Hill	£32,100
23	Jackson Page	£31,600
24	Liam Highfield	£30,500
25	Si Jiahui	£29,000
26	Liu Hongyu	£29,000
27	Fan Zhengyi	£28,400
28	Daniel Wells	£27,900
29	He Guoqiang	£27,500
30	Ding Junhui	£27,000
31	Wu Yize	£27,000
32	Yuan Sijun	£26,500

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Is there a Home Nations Series bonus?

Yes, there will once again be a £150,000 jackpot bonus on offer to the player who performs the best across the Home Nations Series.

The four-tournament section of the schedule comprises the English, Northern Ireland, Scottish, and Welsh Opens.

Ali Carter (£100,000) takes an early lead over Mark Williams (£45,000), with semi-finalists Ding Junhui and Shaun Murphy (£21,000) also off to a positive start on this front.

The Northern Ireland Open will be staged in October.

When is the next snooker event?

The next ranking event on the 2026/27 snooker calendar will be the Shenzhen Open, which runs from September 28 to October 4 in China.

Before that, there is a long batch of qualifiers at the Mattioli Arena with the Northern Ireland Open qualifiers currently being played (Sept 13-16).

Those preliminary rounds will be followed in Leicester by the International Championship qualifiers (Sept 17-19) and the Scottish Open qualifiers (Sept 20-23).

Featured photo credit: WST