She won the 2023 FIDE Women’s Grand Swiss with 8.5/11, qualifying for the 2024 Candidates, just months after her brother qualified at the 2023 FIDE World Cup, as per chess.com. They became the first brother-sister pair ever to reach the Candidates in the same year.

In 2023, at the Qatar Masters Open, Vaishali scored 5/9, capturing the women’s prize and earning her final GM norm. By the end of the Grand Swiss, she needed just three rating points to complete the Grandmaster title, which she secured at the Llobregat Open in Spain on Dec. 1, 2023.

Despite being only the seventh-highest rated player at the 2024 Candidates, she played attacking chess and finished tied for second, as reported by chess.com. Later that year, she played second board for India at the 45th Chess Olympiad, winning gold.