Novel machine learning models outperform risk scores in predicting hepatocellular carcinoma in patients with chronic viral hepatitis

•Accurate hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) risk prediction is helpful in reducing mortality.•Existing HCC risk scores usually include a few known risk factors and preselected parameters.•Machine learning allows for direct selection of predictive parameters without subjective preselection.•HCC ridge score (HCC-RS) built from machine learning modelling has higher accuracy than existing HCC risk scores.•HCC-RS may be incorporated into electronic medical health systems to facilitate real-time update of HCC risk.