As is tradition, HLTV has released their list of the best CS:GO players of last year. The HLTV Top 20 CS:GO Players 2018 was revealed one-by-one throughout January, with the final two revealed the other day. S1mple and dev1ce are, of course, the number one and two spot. But who else made the list and who’s missing?
HLTV Top 20 CS:GO Players 2018
The HLTV Top 20 for 2018 is as follows.
- Aleksandr “s1mple” Kostyliev
- Nicolai “device” Reedtz
- Nikola “NiKo” Kovac
- Denis “electronic” Sharipov
- Peter “dupreeh” Rasmussen
- Keith “NAF” Markovic
- Emil “Magisk” Reif
- Lukas “gla1ve” Rossander
- Freddy “KRIMZ” Johansson
- Marcelo “coldzera” David
- Ladislav “GuardiaN” Kovács
- Russel “Twistzz” Van Dulken
- Andreas “Xyp9x” Højsleth
- Tomáš “oskar” Štastný
- Jonathan “EliGE” Jablonowski
- Miikka “suNny” Kemppi
- Timothy “autimatic” Ta
- Håvard “rain” Nygaard
- Robin “ropz” Kool
- Valdemar “valde” Bjørn Vangså
This largely reflects many lists of top CS:GO players 2018. Despite dev1ce winning event after event with Astralis, many would agree that s1mple edges him out on individual stats.
Players like NiKo, GuardiaN, dupreeh, and coldzera have become top 20 mainstays thanks to their consistent performances. Meanwhile, prospects like valde, ropz, suNny, and Twistzz make nice additions to the list. You can view the full list and descriptions on the HLTV website.
Who Missed Out On The HLTV Top 20?
While HLTV made a well-rounded Top 20, they couldn’t include every stand out player this year. With so many events, there were a fair few missing. Petar Milovanovic of HLTV made a Tweet on who missed out.
Despite their major victory, Stewie2k and tarik were outside of the Top 22. Tarik’s exclusion marks the first time a CS:GO Major MVP winner didn’t make it to the Top 20.
Meanwhile, nahtE and flamie were very close to making the list. Players like CeRq, FalleN, Brehze, tabseN, and fer were also considerations.
With so many upcoming CS:GO players and new team changes, it’ll be interesting to see who makes the list in 2019.