FPL chip strategy basics for 2026/27

Since the 2025/26 season every manager has had two of each chip: a Wildcard, a Free Hit, a Bench Boost and a Triple Captain for gameweeks 1 to 19, and a fresh set for gameweeks 20 to 38. The first set expires unused at the halfway point, so the question is no longer whether to play a chip but when in each half it earns the most.

The Wildcard replaces your whole squad with no hit, and your free transfers are not consumed by it. It is best played when several problems arrive at once: a cluster of injuries, a fixture swing that your current squad is on the wrong side of, or a price rise you want to lock in across many players. Playing it before an international break gives you a fortnight of team news before the deadline.

The Free Hit changes your squad for a single gameweek and then puts everything back. It is made for blank gameweeks, when many clubs have no fixture, and for double gameweeks, when a few clubs play twice. If you keep a note of the rounds where the fixture ticker shows blanks or doubles, you will usually find the Free Hit slot without any guesswork.

The Bench Boost scores all fifteen players, so it pays when your bench has four starters with decent fixtures, which almost always means a double gameweek. Managers often prepare it one round earlier with a Wildcard, so that the whole squad is built around clubs playing twice. The planner shows bench projected points for every round, so you can see exactly what the boost would add.

The Triple Captain gives the captain three times their points. The highest expected return is a premium attacker in a double gameweek with two good fixtures, which is also when ownership of that player tends to be highest, so it is rarely a differential. Use the projection on the player sheet to compare the captain's expected points round by round before you commit.

A simple default plan for each half of the season is: Wildcard when the squad is broken or a fixture swing arrives, Free Hit on the biggest blank, Bench Boost on the biggest double after preparing the bench, Triple Captain on the best double fixture for a premium. Fixture announcements for blanks and doubles arrive in the weeks before the cup rounds, so revisit the plan when they are confirmed.

Do not hold a chip into the last two gameweeks of a half just because it is unused. An average chip return is worth more than a wasted one, and the planner makes it easy to test a late Bench Boost or Triple Captain against the alternatives before the window closes.