OpenPairings

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The OpenPairings user manual

Everything the program does, from the first player to the FIDE report, written for the arbiter at the board. New here? Start with Getting started.

Getting started Press / to search

Preparing the tournament

  1. Getting started This chapter says what OpenPairings is, how to install and start it, and how the program is laid out.
  2. FIDE mode FIDE mode means that the tournament is handled the way FIDE's regulations for pairing and reporting say it must be handled.
  3. 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, Se...
  4. Players and rating lists This chapter covers the rating lists the program keeps, adding and changing players, the player grid, refreshing ratings, and late entries.
  5. Byes and absences A player who does not play a round is recorded in one of a few ways. They differ in how the pairing treats the player, in what the round is worth, ...

Round by round

  1. Pairing a round Pairings are made on the Pairings page. This chapter covers pairing a round in every system, the explanation of a pairing, changing a pairing by ha...
  2. Entering results and postponed games Results are entered on the Pairings page, in the round's table. Each board has a result field between the two players.
  3. Standings and tie-breaks Standings shows the ranking after the rounds played. For a Swiss tournament the table has the rank, the name, the rating, the points, and one colum...

Reports and exports

  1. Printing Every printable document opens in a new browser tab as an ordinary page that starts the browser's print dialog.
  2. Sending to FIDE: the rating report A rated tournament is reported to FIDE in a TRF file (Tournament Report File).
  3. Categories, norms and the Advanced tools Categories divide a tournament's players into groups for prizes, for separate standings and, optionally, for separate pairing (rating groups such a...
  4. Import and export OpenPairings reads and writes several formats. They differ in purpose:

Team tournaments

  1. Team tournaments A team tournament is one whose format is Swiss (teams) or Round robin (teams):

Publishing and sharing

  1. Publishing: the results site and the live page A tournament can be published to OpenResults, a separate read-only results site.
  2. OpenResults: the public results site OpenResults is the read-only site where spectators follow a tournament:
  3. Accounts, sharing, hand-off and backups On a server, everyone has an account. You sign in with an e-mail link (a one-time link sent to your address), a password, or the organisation's sin...

Live boards

  1. Live boards and Alnasl Live boards show the games of a round as they are played, move by move, with the clocks, on the results site.
  2. Setting up electronic boards This chapter is the set-up guide for live boards, start to finish: what to buy or bring, what to click in which program, and what to do when a roun...

Manubrium, the phone app

  1. The Manubrium app Manubrium is a phone app for running a tournament from the playing hall.
  2. Manubrium privacy policy Effective 2026-10-21. Applies to the Manubrium app for iOS and Android.

Other programs

The programs that work beside OpenPairings, from the engine inside it to the printer in the hall. Each page starts with what the program is and when you need it.