Tournament Bracket Generator
Build a single elimination bracket for 2–64 teams in seconds — automatic seeding, automatic byes, live score tracking, printing, PNG export and one-click shareable links. Free, no sign-up, no watermark.
How it works
- Enter your teams. Type one name per line (the top line is the No.1 seed), or just set the team count and rename teams later by clicking any name in the bracket.
- Generate. The bracket is drawn instantly with standard seeding and byes placed automatically.
- Track, share, print. Enter scores to advance winners, copy a share link, print a clean sheet or download a PNG.
How single elimination brackets work
Single elimination — also called a knockout, sudden death or cup format — is the simplest and most widely used tournament structure in the world. Every match eliminates one participant: win and you move on to the next round, lose and you are out. The format keeps going until only one undefeated champion remains. It is the structure behind March Madness, the FIFA World Cup knockout stage, Wimbledon, most esports playoffs, and countless office foosball tournaments.
The math of a knockout bracket is elegant. Because each match eliminates exactly one team, a tournament with N teams always needs exactly N − 1 matches to produce a champion — no more, no less. An 8-team bracket plays 7 matches over 3 rounds; a 16-team bracket plays 15 matches over 4 rounds. The number of rounds is the base-2 logarithm of the bracket size, rounded up: doubling the field only adds one extra round, which is why knockout events scale so well from 4 players to 128.
Byes: what happens when your team count isn't a power of two
Brackets are built on powers of two: 4, 8, 16, 32, 64. If you have, say, 13 teams, the bracket is drawn at 16 slots and the 3 empty slots become byes — free passes through round one. The convention, used by virtually every governing body, is to give the byes to the highest seeds. With 13 teams, seeds 1, 2 and 3 would skip straight to the quarterfinal stage while the remaining ten teams play five first-round matches. BracketForge applies this rule automatically, so an awkward entry list of 5, 7, 11 or 27 never breaks your bracket.
Seeding: keeping the best for last
Seeding exists to stop the two strongest entrants from meeting in round one. Rank your teams from strongest to weakest, and the bracket places them so that in every round the highest remaining seed faces the lowest remaining seed if favorites keep winning. In a 16-team draw that means 1 plays 16, 8 plays 9, 5 plays 12, and so on — and the No.1 and No.2 seeds are planted in opposite halves so they can only ever collide in the final. If you would rather leave it to luck, switch the generator to Random draw and the field is shuffled with a fair Fisher–Yates shuffle before being placed.
Third place matches and other options
Many events — the World Cup being the most famous — add a third place match between the two semifinal losers so that bronze is decided on the field rather than by tiebreaker. Tick the "Third place match" option and BracketForge adds the consolation game beneath the main bracket and fills it automatically as your semifinals finish. And because everything lives in the link itself, you can send the bracket to a co-organizer, project it on a screen between rounds, or reopen it on your phone courtside — no accounts, no apps, no server storage.
Bracket size reference table
Rounds, total matches and byes for the most common tournament sizes:
| Teams | Rounds | Total matches | Byes | Bracket size |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 3 | 2 | 2 | 1 | 4 |
| 4 | 2 | 3 | 0 | 4 |
| 5 | 3 | 4 | 3 | 8 |
| 6 | 3 | 5 | 2 | 8 |
| 7 | 3 | 6 | 1 | 8 |
| 8 | 3 | 7 | 0 | 8 |
| 9 | 4 | 8 | 7 | 16 |
| 10 | 4 | 9 | 6 | 16 |
| 11 | 4 | 10 | 5 | 16 |
| 12 | 4 | 11 | 4 | 16 |
| 13 | 4 | 12 | 3 | 16 |
| 14 | 4 | 13 | 2 | 16 |
| 15 | 4 | 14 | 1 | 16 |
| 16 | 4 | 15 | 0 | 16 |
| 20 | 5 | 19 | 12 | 32 |
| 24 | 5 | 23 | 8 | 32 |
| 32 | 5 | 31 | 0 | 32 |
| 48 | 6 | 47 | 16 | 64 |
| 64 | 6 | 63 | 0 | 64 |
Frequently asked questions
What is a bye in a tournament bracket?
A bye is a free pass through the first round. When the number of teams is not a power of two (4, 8, 16, 32...), some teams skip round one and start in round two. Byes are awarded to the highest seeds, so the strongest entrants are rewarded for their ranking.
How does seeding work in a single elimination bracket?
Seeding ranks the entrants from strongest (No.1 seed) to weakest and places them so the top seeds cannot meet until the late rounds. In a 16-team bracket the standard first-round pairings are 1v16, 8v9, 5v12, 4v13, 3v14, 6v11, 7v10 and 2v15 — the two best teams can only face each other in the final.
Can I print the bracket or save it as an image?
Yes. Click Print for a clean landscape printout (all menus and text are hidden automatically), or click Download PNG to save a high-resolution image you can post in a group chat or on social media.
How do I share my bracket with other people?
Click Share Link. The full bracket state — team names, scores and results — is compressed into the link itself. Anyone who opens the link sees exactly the same bracket. There is no account and nothing is stored on a server.
How many teams does the generator support?
Any number from 2 to 64 teams. Byes are added automatically whenever the team count is not a power of two, so odd numbers like 5, 7 or 13 work fine.
Is BracketForge really free?
Completely free. No sign-up, no watermark, no locked features. The tool runs entirely in your browser.
Brackets by team count
Jump straight to a ready-made bracket for your exact field size: