Creating a tournament and its settings

This chapter covers the New tournament form and every Settings page except the publishing page (Publishing), the Export page (Import and export, Sending to FIDE) and Categories (Categories and norms).

Creating a tournament#

Tournaments, New tournament.

The form starts with your defaults (Account page, New tournaments: system, rounds, format, rate of play, place, organiser, publishing mode). The tournament is created in FIDE mode (FIDE mode).

Other ways to start a tournament: Import a .swar file, a .trf file, a JSON backup, or Receive a hand-off (see Import and export and Accounts, sharing and hand-off); or Copy an existing tournament on the list (a copy contains everything in the original, rounds and results included, and is named Copy of …).

What must be set before pairing#

The Players and Pairings pages say what is still missing and link to the page where it is set. The Pairings page also warns, before round 1 and without blocking, when the number of rounds cannot be paired for the players registered: a Swiss with more rounds than the players allow without a rematch, or a round robin whose number of rounds does not match the number of players. The warning links to the setting; if you keep the number, the round that cannot be paired is made by hand (Pairing a round). Recommended, but not required: the chief arbiter, the federation, the rate of play and (for a FIDE-rated tournament) the FIDE tournament ID.

The Settings pages#

The Settings menu in the top bar opens the Tournament page. Every Settings page has the list of pages beside it (above it on a phone), in three groups: Set-up (Tournament, Group, Options, Scoring, Tie-breaks, Dates, Rooms, Categories, Extra points, Forbidden pairings), Publishing (OpenResults, Live boards) and Reporting (FIDE, Export, About).

A page with a Save button remembers what you typed. Leaving it with edits not saved - a link, the menu, closing the tab - asks first; saving forgets the question. Controls that save the moment they change, such as a collaborator's role, do not count as unsaved edits.

Common and advanced settings#

Each page first shows what nearly every tournament sets. The rest waits behind the switch Show advanced settings at the top of the page. The switch belongs to your account: it is the same on every Settings page, in every tournament and on every computer you sign in on. Hiding a setting never changes it - an advanced setting keeps its value and is saved with the page as before.

When an advanced setting on the page is not at its default, the page says so beside the switch (2 advanced settings are not at their defaults - show them); a click shows them. A page with nothing advanced in it, as it stands for your tournament, shows no switch. A few cards are advanced only while unused: a tournament with a logo, with wishes among its forbidden pairings, with a per-round FIDE ID range or with its entry form open always shows that card.

Two more things keep the pages short:

• The settings of one pairing system show only while that system is chosen on the Options page. Pick Round robin and the Swiss settings go away at once, before you save.
• A feature with its own tick box shows only the tick box until it is on: Tournament lasts more than 30 days, Allow postponed games, This tournament is FIDE-homologated. The two limits on paid absences appear once Points for a round sat out has a value.

A form saves with its own Save button, and the answer appears beside it. When a colleague changes the same settings while you are typing, the page tells you that it is out of date instead of overwriting what you typed. Every settings change is written to the audit trail with the old and the new value.

A hint under a setting shows one line; point at the setting, or click into it, for the rest.

Tournament page#

General. Name (required), venue, city, federation, organiser, and (advanced) the organiser's club number. Tournament format is the type: Swiss (individual), Round robin (individual), Swiss (teams), Round robin (teams). Once round 1 is paired the format is fixed, with a sentence saying so and no Unlock: the rounds already played were made for it, and for another format you start a new tournament. Number of rounds can be changed until the first round is paired (in a round robin the number follows from the players and cycles).

Organiser. This page owns the organiser: the name and its FIDE ID, picked from the FIDE list the same way as an official (type a name or an ID and pick the result). Without a list on the computer, or with nobody matching, an ID typed in the ID box can be taken as typed and is marked unverified. When the name is changed without picking again, the page warns that the FIDE ID belongs to the old name, and saving clears it rather than pinning it on somebody else. The Officials and norms page shows the organiser, with a link back here.

Special formats. The tick Chess960 says that the tournament is played as Chess960. The arbiter then draws a starting position for each round on the Pairings page (Pairing a round). The tick Tournament lasts more than 30 days lets a player hold more than one rating during the event; once it is on, the two settings for the rating-based tie-breaks appear under it (Standings and tie-breaks), and so does Reporting to FIDE: monthly reports or one report at the end (Postponed games explains both). A ? beside the tick explains it. In such an event Refresh ratings adds a new list's ratings as later ratings from a round instead of replacing the starting rating (Refreshing ratings), and the pairing numbers never change because of them. When the round dates span more than 30 days and the tick is off, the card says so.

Share / Team. The owner can invite other arbiters by e-mail address, change a collaborator's role (Editor or Arbiter) with the select beside the name, and Resend invitation to someone who has not accepted yet (at most once a minute; see Accounts, sharing and hand-off).

Logo (advanced until a logo is set). A PNG, JPEG, GIF or WebP image of at most 2 MB, stored with the tournament and printed on the documents.

Tournament groups#

One event is often several separate tournaments: the Open, a youth section, a rapid on the side. Each has its own players, rounds and pairings - that is what makes them separate tournaments rather than categories of one. A group strings them together.

On Settings → Group (its own page in the Set-up list):

• Create group starts a new group, named as you like, with this tournament in it.
• Or add it to an existing group lists the groups you can already edit - the ones holding a tournament you may edit - and adds this tournament at the end. A tournament is in one group at most.
• This tournament's label in the switcher is a short name such as Open or U20. Empty, the switcher shows the tournament's own name.
• The arrows change the order, the Rename button the group's name.
• Take out of the group removes this tournament from it. Nothing in the tournament itself changes. The last tournament out removes the group.

Once a group holds two tournaments you can open, every page of each starts with a switcher: the group's name and its tournaments side by side, the current one marked. A click opens the same page of the other tournament - Standings to Standings, a settings page to the same settings page - or its Players page when it has no such page (the Teams page of an individual tournament, one round's explanation). On a phone the switcher is a dropdown.

Who may do what: anyone who may edit a tournament - its owner, or a collaborator who accepted the invitation - may put it in a group, label it, reorder the group or take it out. The switcher and the card only ever show the tournaments you may open. A tournament shared with you alone does not reveal the rest of the event.

On the Tournaments page the tournaments of a group are listed together under the group's name, in the group's order. The arrow before the name folds the group away. Archive group, at the end of the group's row, archives all its tournaments in one go once the event is over (after asking, and naming any postponed games still unplayed). It archives only the tournaments on your own list; one handed off to another copy of the app is left alone. Unarchive still works per tournament. Archived and handed-off tournaments are read-only here too: unarchive or take back first. A tournament in the recycle bin drops out of the switcher and returns to its group when restored; deleting it for good takes it out.

Groups do not change pairing, standings or FIDE reports.

A group on the results site#

When two or more tournaments of a group are published, OpenResults shows them as one event: a row of tabs at the top of each tournament's pages (Open | U20 | U12, by label, in the group's order) that opens the same page of the other one - standings to standings, round 3 to round 3 - and an event page that lists them with their number of players and the round they are in. The front page of the results site gathers them under the group's name. The card Group shows Open the event page once this tournament is part of one.

• Only published tournaments are named. A tournament of the group that is not published, is in the recycle bin or was handed off appears nowhere on the results site: not its name, not its label, not a gap where it would be.
• A tournament that is published but not listed on the front page is named only on the other tournaments that are not listed either. A listed page never points to a link-only one.
• The group's name is public as the event's name as soon as two of its tournaments are published.
• Publishing or withdrawing a tournament, renaming it, changing a label, the order or the group's name sends the other tournaments again by itself; you do not publish them one by one.

Options page#

Shown by default: the pairing system, the tournament rating, the cycles (round robin), the Keizer top value (Keizer), the line-ups (team events) and the type and rate of play. Everything else on this page is advanced. The Swiss settings show only for a Swiss, the round robin ones only for a round robin.

Pairing system. The system is fixed once the first round is paired.

Swiss engine. Every Swiss tournament is paired by Ainalrami, which is built into the program and follows C.04.3 as it stands from 1 February 2026. There is nothing to choose or install; the page names it. The engine is given a TRF file built and checked by the program.

Tournament rating. The rating that ranks the players, and so gives them their pairing numbers, and that the rating-based tie-breaks read. The choices are the methods of the TRF26 report: FIDE rating only (FIDE), National rating only (NRO), FIDE rating, else national (FIDON), which is the default, National rating, else FIDE (NIDOF), Highest of FIDE, national and manual (HBFN) and Manual rating per player (OTHER). A manual rating is typed per player (Tournament rating on the player's form, Players and rating lists).

Equal rating and title. Players with the same tournament rating are ordered by FIDE title (GM, IM, WGM, FM, WIM, CM, WFM, WCM, no title), and then by this criterion: alphabetically (the FIDE default), by FIDE ID (lowest first), oldest first or youngest first. Announce the criterion before the event.

Late entrants' pairing numbers (Swiss only). By rating (the default) gives a player who joins after the numbers were given the number their rating earns and moves everybody below one place down (C.04.2 2.4); rounds already played keep their boards. After the field gives them the next free number instead. The FIDE rules do not, so choosing it takes the tournament out of FIDE mode (FIDE mode). A tournament created before By rating became the default keeps After the field as it had it, without leaving FIDE mode; so does a backup file from that time when it is imported. Such a tournament says so once, on this page and on the Pairings page, until round 4 is paired: Switch to by rating changes the setting, Keep leaves it, and either answer is remembered. Changing these three settings after round 1 renumbers nobody already numbered; the page says so.

A player absent from round 1 (a requested bye, an absence, a later start round) is a late entrant too: they get no pairing number when round 1 is paired, and are numbered when they arrive, by the setting above (C.04.2 2.4). If round 1 is unpaired and paired again with them present, they are numbered with the field by rating. This holds for every Swiss tournament created from version 0.79 on, which have it switched on. A tournament created earlier, or imported from a TRF or SWAR file, keeps numbering round-1 absentees with the field as it always did: its numbers came from somewhere else and stay as they are. It can be switched on, or off again, with the checkbox Players absent from round 1 are late entries right below the setting above, but only until round 1 is paired; after that the checkbox is greyed out, because switching would renumber players in rounds already played. Baku always has it on, and the checkbox does not appear for a round robin or Keizer. A backup file keeps what its tournament had.

Initial colour. For the first round of a Swiss tournament: drawn by lot when round 1 is paired, or White or Black chosen by you. The colour that was used is shown on the Pairings page under round 1.

Cycles (round robin): how many times everyone plays everyone, any number from 1 to 10 - 1 is a single round robin, 2 a double, 3 a triple. Every cycle plays the Berger table again with the colours reversed from the cycle before. Play the last two rounds of the first cycle in reverse order follows FIDE C.05 and is offered for a double round robin only (FIDE describes it for two cycles, and the TRF has no code for it in any other length). The number of cycles can still be raised until the second cycle has begun; a double round robin whose reversed rounds are already paired stays double.

Keizer top value: the value of the top rung of the Keizer ladder, or blank for the automatic value.

Acceleration. None, or Baku acceleration (FIDE C.04.7): the program works out every player's virtual points in the first rounds and gives them to the engine, round by round. It applies to Swiss tournaments only and cannot be changed once the first round is paired. Group A is counted over the players paired in round 1: somebody absent from round 1 (a requested bye, an absence, a later start round) gets no pairing number until they arrive, and is then numbered like any late entrant (C.04.2 2.4), after the field or by rating as Late entrants' pairing numbers says.

Swiss match format. Each pairing is played twice in a row, the second game with the colours reversed. It needs an even number of rounds (each match is two rounds).

Teams (team tournaments): whether line-ups are required, and (advanced) the way a team's rating is worked out for the order of the teams, and the rating counted for an unrated player. See Teams.

Tournament type & rate of play. The type (Standard, Rapid, Blitz) and the time control from a list, or (advanced) typed in under Other rate of play. The rate of play is written into the TRF report.

Forbidden pairings and the club and federation rules have their own page, below.

Forbidden pairings page#

Who must not meet whom. Everything here is kept by the Swiss engine and by Keizer; a round robin's schedule is fixed and ignores it.

Effect on the next round. How many of the games the field could have are ruled out, and how many wishes there are. When the restrictions and the games already played leave a player nobody to meet, or leave no way to pair the round at all, the page says so in red before you press Pair. When they rule out more than half of the possible games it warns that the engine has little left to choose from. A forfeited board is not a game played: the two may still be paired with each other, and the page counts them so.

Rules. Players of the same club or Players of the same federation do not meet - every club or federation, or only the ones you list (comma separated). Each rule is either Never - a rule or If possible - a wish, and holds for Every round, The first rounds, The last rounds (counted back from the number of rounds) or From round … to round …. A rule follows the players as they are when a round is paired, so a late entrant or a corrected club is covered without touching it. Each rule shows what it does now, for example 4 pairs among 2 clubs; Edit and Remove work in place; Remove asks first and names what goes.

Players who must not meet. Search by name, club or federation, tick two or more players and press Keep these N apart. Two players make a forbidden pair, three or more a group whose members never meet each other. Only if possible makes it a wish. A pair can be turned into a wish or back into a rule with Make it a wish / Make it a rule; a group is changed with Edit, which ticks its members so you can add or remove some, then Save group.

In a team Swiss the page keeps teams apart, not players: Teams of the same club (the club typed on each team's card, compared trimmed and without regard to capitals; a team with no club is never grouped) and Teams I choose (tick the teams that must not meet each other). Rule or wish, and the rounds it holds for, are chosen exactly as above. A rule is never seated; a wish only decides between pairings C.04.6 ranks equal and never costs a colour, a floater or the bye. If the rules leave a round no pairing where it would pair without them, Pair round N says so, names the groups in force and which of them, lifted alone, would let the round through. The player pickers are not shown. See Teams.

A pair or a rule added once rounds are paired holds from the next round to be paired, and the TRF report says so. Unpair a round afterwards and it holds from that round: pair it again and the restriction is applied.

How hard to try the wishes (advanced until there is a wish). Strong puts the wishes before the colour and float criteria, Weak uses them only as a last tie-break. Wishes are applied by the Swiss engine only: Keizer keeps the rules but ignores the wishes, and the page says so.

Scoring page#

Points for a win (default 1), a draw (½) and a loss (0), and the value of the pairing-allocated bye (default: a win).

Outside FIDE mode these can still be changed after round 1, to fix a mistake. Once rounds are paired, a changed value shows a warning before you save: new points re-score every round already played, and standings, tie-breaks and anything published move with them.

Match points (team events): 2 for a won match, 1 for a drawn match, 0 for a lost match by default; and, advanced, the match points and game points of a pairing-allocated bye; what a match forfeited as a whole pays in game points (Teams); and the treatment of a team that withdraws.

Byes and absences. (advanced) Points for a round sat out is the value of a round a player was absent for (blank: absences score nothing). Two optional limits go with it, shown once it has a value: the last round it still applies to, and a cap on how many of a player's rounds are paid. The three settings after them are advanced. Treat a round sat out as a voluntary unplayed round for tiebreaks changes how the tie-breaks of C.07 treat those rounds; a round paid as much as a win is a full-point bye there whatever this says (C.07 16.1.1 keeps "requested bye" for half a point or none). Rounds before a late entrant joins count as absences pays the rounds before a late entry in the same way. These settings change the points, the tie-breaks and with them the standings, and are locked after round 1. Ask the bye type for each absence (individual Swiss, off by default) makes the registration form ask whether each round sat out is a half-point, zero-point or full-point bye, with the answer the points above give already picked; see Byes and absences.

Postponed games. Allow postponed games offers a postponed result on the Pairings page; the two values below it show once it is ticked. Until a postponed game is played it counts for the player who postponed it, and for the opponent, as set here (a draw for both by default, which is the FIDE rule). A round robin always offers postponed results, so there the switch is shown on and locked; the values still apply. See Results.

Tie-breaks page#

The list that orders players level on points, in the rail right after Scoring. It has its own Save settings; nothing else of the tournament is saved with it. A preset fills the list at once, the arrows move a tie-break and the cross removes it, and Add a tie-break builds one in two steps. How each one is calculated is described in Standings and tie-breaks. With Show advanced settings the page also holds How an unrated player is counted in the tie-breaks (with the rating typed for it) and Players still level share a place. In FIDE mode the whole list is locked once round 1 is paired, with a note saying so.

Dates page#

One date for each round:

• Fill sequentially from round 1 puts consecutive days,
• Calculate weekly from round 1 puts one week between rounds,
• Clear all empties them.

The dates are used on the printed lists, the TRF report (record 132), the match result sheets and the results site. The start and end date of the tournament are derived from them.

The dates must follow the rounds: a round dated before an earlier round is refused, naming both rounds. Two rounds may share a date (the double round on a Saturday), and a blank date is not out of order.

Rooms page#

For a hall of more than one room. Each room has a name and the boards it holds, typed the way you would say them: 1-20, 35, 40-45 (commas, semicolons or spaces between them; 1 - 20 is one range). Add a room adds a row, Remove takes one away, and Save rooms keeps the lot.

Every row is checked as you type, and the line under it says what it read (Boards 1-20, 35: 21 boards.) or what is wrong:

• every room needs a name, and no two rooms may share one (capitals do not make a name different);
• a board can be in one room only - Board 18 is already in Main hall.;
• a board in no room is fine, and so is a room with no boards yet.

A board's number is the number its label starts with: a team tournament's board 3.1 is in the room that holds 3, and a fixed table counts by its own number.

Once a tournament has rooms, the Pairings page names the room above the first board of each room, and the printed pairing list and the alphabetical list get a Room column. A tournament without rooms looks as it always did.

Where a print station or a hall announcer is installed, it can be placed in one of these rooms: a print station then prints only that room's boards, an announcer reads only that room's boards. Renaming a room keeps what was placed in it; removing a room leaves those devices in no room, which means the whole hall again.

The rooms travel in the tournament's JSON export and come back on import.

Extra points page#

Extra points are points added on top of the game points by an arbiter. There are two kinds:

• Handicap: a head start for players below a rating.
• Acceleration: SWAR's extra points, for players at or above a rating; they bring the strong players together earlier.

Elo bands are written as rating:bonus pairs, separated by commas. Apply bands to players gives each player the points of their band; points can also be typed per player on the Players page. Count extra points (standings and pairing) makes the standings (and, for a handicap, the pairing) use them; for acceleration the switch is called Keep acceleration points in the final standings. In the TRF report they appear in record 299.

Apply bands to players asks first and keeps a restore point, because it overwrites the extra points of every player a band matches. Remove half a point (acceleration only) asks first too, naming the rating range, and keeps a restore point. When the bands typed in the form differ from the saved ones, a hint says to save first. Saving answers Saved. beside the button.

Officials and norms page#

Officials. The chief arbiter, the person responsible for the pairings, two ranked deputy arbiters and as many further arbiters as the event had (+ Add arbiter), the chief arbiter's and organiser's e-mail addresses, the IT4 event type and the link to the pairings web page, and four special remarks for the IT3. Type a name or a FIDE ID and pick the matching player: every official needs a FIDE ID, and a save with a named official without one is refused, because FIDE bounces such a report. With no FIDE list on the computer, or nobody matching, type the ID in the ID box and press Use ... as typed (unverified): the forms use it like any other, and the page marks it unverified until the official is picked from a list. The organiser is shown here read-only; it is set on the Tournament page. The IT3, FA1, IA1 and IT4 forms on the Norms page are filled in from these (Categories and norms).

Title norms. Event type for title norms tells the norm judgment what kind of event the FIDE Title Regulations (B.01) see this one as. Only the kinds that fit the tournament (team or individual) are offered:

Beside it the page says whether the big open Swiss clause (1.4.3 d) applies. There is nothing to set: the program counts it from the players. An individual Swiss qualifies when at least 20 FIDE-rated players from outside the host federation (the tournament's own federation, under Tournament), from at least 3 federations, at least 10 of them GM, IM, WGM or WIM, each missed at most one of the completed rounds. A pairing-allocated bye is not a missed round; a requested bye, an absence or a lost forfeit is. Players under the FIDE flag are not counted. When it applies, nobody's norm needs the federation mix.

Locks#

After the first round is paired some settings are locked because they decide what already happened: the tournament format (which has no Unlock), the pairing system and engine, the match formats, the pairing by category, the absence scoring, the initial colour and (team events) the boards per match and line-up rules. In FIDE mode the list is longer; see FIDE mode.