Esports bracket generator
Two formats dominate competitive gaming: double elimination with its losers run, and Swiss for open fields. Both are in this editor, with series scores instead of game scores.
Editing is designed for desktop. On this screen you can view the bracket; open the tools below if you need to change something.
Everything stays editable: type your own team names, set scores and dates, then export the bracket as an image — a PNG in three sizes, no watermark.
Double elimination, drawn as the broadcast shows it
The standard major format: a winners bracket, a losers bracket, and a grand final. Here the two brackets are laid out in separate bands, so the losers run reads left to right instead of being tangled into one tree.
Eight teams in double elimination is 14 matches (2N − 2) against 7 in a single elimination bracket. That extra half-day is what buys the comeback story the format is loved for.
Entering series scores
A best-of-three is recorded as 2-1 and a best-of-five as 3-2 — one number per side, the series result. The bracket then advances the series winner automatically.
If a series is decided by a forfeit or a walkover, record the score you want to publish and advance the winner by hand; the bracket is not going to argue about it.
Swiss for open fields
Open qualifiers with 16 or 32 entrants are often run as Swiss, because nobody is eliminated while the field is still sorting itself out. Rounds are set by size — 5 rounds for 32 entrants — and each round pairs players on the same record.
Pairings are computed from results, so the next round can only be published once the previous round is complete. That is honest rather than broken: the pairings genuinely do not exist until the results do.
Frequently asked questions
- Why use double elimination for esports?
- Because it keeps the strongest teams in the event after one bad series — which is what makes long broadcast days worth watching — at the cost of roughly twice the matches: 14 instead of 7 for 8 teams.
- Can I run Swiss with a big open qualifier?
- Yes, with an even team count between 4 and 32. Rounds are ⌈log₂ N⌉, so 16 entrants need 4 rounds and 32 need 5, and nobody is eliminated early.
- How do I show a 2-1 series win?
- Enter 2-1 as the score. The score field is a scoreline, so a series score and a single-game score are entered the same way.