With few exceptions, it has consisted of the ski jumping events held at Oberstdorf, Garmisch-Partenkirchen, Innsbruck and Bischofshofen, in this order.

Unlike the World Cup ranking, however, the actual points scored during the competitions are the ones that are used to determine the winner.

In 2005–06, Janne Ahonen and Jakub Janda shared the overall victory after finishing with exactly the same points total after the four competitions.

In 2017–18 season Kamil Stoch became the second ski jumper in history to obtain this achievement, and just a year later, in the 2018–19 edition, Ryōyū Kobayashi became the third.

On the other hand, jumpers are less likely to be disadvantaged by a possible significant change in weather conditions between the start and end of the first series.

In the event of significantly worse conditions during the second half of the first series, the possibility exists that most of the best jumpers would be eliminated by bad luck alone.

Helmut Recknagel, Bjørn Wirkola, Kamil Stoch and Ryōyū Kobayashi have the third best record, winning three titles each.

In 2017-18 Kamil Stoch has repeated Hannawald's record and year after, Ryōyū Kobayashi became the third person to win all four events.

[citation needed] In 1965, the Polish jumper, Stanisław Marusarz (silver medal in World Championship, 1938 in Lahti) who was visiting the tournament, asked the jury in Garmisch-Partenkirchen to allow him a showcase jump.