ECS reports grants and personal fees from Bristol Meyer-Squibb, grants, and personal fees from Astra Zeneca; personal fees from Amgen; personal fees from Daiichi Sankyo; personal fees and non-financial support from Mirati; personal fees from Merck; personal fees from Viracta; personal fees from Astellas; personal fees from Novartis; personal fees from Pfizer; personal fees from Zymeworks; and personal fees from Beigene, outside the submitted work. ECS is also the chair of the European Organization for Research and Treatment Gastric Cancer Taskforce (2021–24), and a trustee for the UK and Ireland Oesophagogastric Cancer Group (2022–present). ECS is supported by the National Institute for Health and Care Research Biomedical Research Centre at Oxford. RS reports receiving funding for advisory board participation and honoraria for talks from Bristol Myers Squibb; advisory board participation from Merck; advisory board participation and travel from Eisai; advisory board participation from Bayer; advisory board participation, honoraria for talks and travel from Taiho; advisory board participation from Novartis; advisory board participation, honoraria for talks and research funding from Merck & Co; advisory board participation from GlaxoSmithKline; advisory board participation, honoraria for talks, travel from DiethelmKellerSiberHegner; advisory board participation advisory board and honoraria for talks from Astellas; advisory board participation from Pierre-Fabre; advisory board participation from Tavotek; honoraria for talks from Eli Lilly; honoraria for talks and travel from Roche; honoraria for talks and travel from Astra Zeneca; honoraria for talks from Daiichi Sankyo, honoraria for talks for Beigene; honoraria for talks and travel from Ipsen; research funding from and patents with Paxman Coolers; research funding from Natera; and travel from CytoMed Therapeutics, outside the submitted work. In addition, RS is an inventor on a patent titled “Method to predict for benefit from immune checkpoint inhibition in metastatic gastric cancer”, which is currently pending patent nationalisation and is not licensed. The products for which the patents are held are not related to assessing PD-1 expression, and the patent rights have been assigned to A*STAR, Duke-NUS, and the National University Hospital, Singapore rather than to RS. ECS and RS are co-principal investigators of the ASPIRE EORTC study. The views expressed in this Comment are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the National Health Service, the National Institute for Health and Care Research, or the Department of Health.