Single elimination bracket generator
Lose once and you are out. The fastest way to a winner.
A single elimination bracket — a knockout — pairs everyone up, sends the winners forward and the losers home. It is the format most people picture when they hear the word tournament, and the one that fits an evening.
TurniCup builds the bracket from your list of names, places the byes for you, and gives you a QR code so players can follow the results from their own phones.
How a single elimination bracket works
Participants are paired in the first round. Each winner moves one round closer to the final; each loser is finished. The bracket halves every round until one player is left.
The number of matches is always one fewer than the number of participants — 16 players means 15 matches, because every match eliminates exactly one person and everyone but the champion has to be eliminated. That makes the length of the event easy to plan: multiply 15 by your average match time and you have your evening.
The number of rounds is how many times you can halve the field: 8 players is 3 rounds, 16 players is 4, 32 is 5, 64 is 6.
Byes, when your field is not 8, 16 or 32
Brackets are built on powers of two, and real sign-up sheets rarely are. If 12 people turn up, the bracket is a 16-slot bracket with 4 empty slots. Those empty slots are byes: the players facing them advance to round two without playing.
The rule is to give the byes to the strongest seeds, so the top of the field is not knocked out by an accident of the draw. TurniCup places them that way automatically — you add 12 names and get a correct 12-player bracket, not a broken 16-player one.
Seeding, and why it matters here more than anywhere
In a knockout a single unlucky first-round pairing removes a favourite for good. Seeding spreads the strongest entries so they meet as late as possible: seed 1 at the top, seed 2 at the bottom, and the rest filled in so the best possible final is still reachable.
If you have no ratings to seed from, a random draw is honest and defensible. What you should avoid is entering names in the order they signed up — friends and clubmates register together and end up eliminating each other in round one.
When single elimination is the right choice
Use it when time or space is the binding constraint: a pub darts night, a one-day club championship, a school event with a hall booked until six, a side event squeezed around a main draw.
Do not use it when the result has to be defensible — a league title, a ranking event, or anything where a player travelling a long way deserves more than one match. For those, double elimination or a round robin is worth the extra time.
Build one in a few minutes
- 1
Create the tournament
Name it, and pick single elimination as the format.
- 2
Add the participants
Type or paste your list. Any number — byes are placed for you.
- 3
Generate the bracket
The draw is built, seeded and ready to play.
- 4
Share the QR code
Players and spectators open the live bracket on their own phones.
- 5
Enter results as you go
Every score updates the bracket for everyone watching, instantly.
Common questions
- How many matches is a single elimination tournament?
- Always one fewer than the number of participants. 8 players is 7 matches, 16 is 15, 32 is 31, 64 is 63.
- What if I do not have 8, 16 or 32 players?
- The bracket is padded to the next power of two and the empty slots become byes, given to the top seeds. A 12-player or 21-player field works exactly the same as a 16-player one.
- Can I add a third-place match?
- Yes. The two losing semi-finalists play for third, which is worth doing at events that award three medals.
- Is the bracket generator free?
- Yes. You can create and run a tournament for free; paid plans exist only for larger fields and more tournaments running at once.