Whether it's a fun tournament on a Friday evening or the club championship: before the first ball is played, you need a tournament schedule. Who plays whom, when, on which court – and how long will it all take? In this guide you'll create your schedule in five steps, with ready-made fixtures for 4, 5, 6 and 8 players that you can use straight away.
Step 1: Settle the Basics
Four pieces of information determine everything that follows. Clarify them before you plan a single line:
- Players: how many? Singles, doubles or mixed? Women and men together or separately?
- Courts or tables: how many matches can take place at the same time?
- Time budget: how long do you have the hall or the courts?
- Occasion: is it about fun, or is a title at stake?
Step 2: Choose the Right Format
The tournament format determines the logic behind the fixtures. The most common formats at a glance:
| Format | Suits | Key feature |
|---|---|---|
| Round robin | small groups of up to about 8 | the fairest, but many rounds |
| Knockout | many players, little time | much fairer with a group stage |
| Swiss system | medium to large fields | balanced matches, fixed number of rounds |
| Americano / Mexicano | social doubles, especially padel | new partners every round |
| King of the Court | fun events with several tables | winners move up, losers move down |
Not sure? In the article Which Tournament Format Suits a Fun Tournament? we go through the decision step by step.
Step 3: Calculate Rounds and Time
The basic formula is: total time = (waves per round × time per match + changeover) × number of rounds + breaks. The waves depend on the courts or tables available: matches per round divided by the number of courts, rounded up. Three matches on three courts are one wave; three matches on two courts are already two.
An example: six players play a round robin. That's five rounds of three matches each. With three courts, 15 minutes per match and 3 minutes for the changeover, the tournament takes (1 × 15 + 3) × 5 = 90 minutes. With only two courts, each round needs two waves: (2 × 15 + 3) × 5 = 165 minutes.
Step 4: Set Up the Fixtures
For a round robin there's a proven method, the so-called circle method: one player stays in place, everyone else moves one position on after each round. That way, every player meets every other player exactly once. The following plans were created this way – you can use them directly. Give every player a number and read off who plays whom, and when.
Schedule for 4 Players (3 Rounds)
| Round | Match 1 | Match 2 |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 – 4 | 2 – 3 |
| 2 | 2 – 4 | 1 – 3 |
| 3 | 3 – 4 | 1 – 2 |
Schedule for 6 Players (5 Rounds)
| Round | Match 1 | Match 2 | Match 3 |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 – 6 | 2 – 5 | 3 – 4 |
| 2 | 2 – 6 | 1 – 3 | 4 – 5 |
| 3 | 3 – 6 | 2 – 4 | 1 – 5 |
| 4 | 4 – 6 | 3 – 5 | 1 – 2 |
| 5 | 5 – 6 | 1 – 4 | 2 – 3 |
Schedule for 8 Players (7 Rounds)
| Round | Match 1 | Match 2 | Match 3 | Match 4 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1 – 8 | 2 – 7 | 3 – 6 | 4 – 5 |
| 2 | 2 – 8 | 1 – 3 | 4 – 7 | 5 – 6 |
| 3 | 3 – 8 | 2 – 4 | 1 – 5 | 6 – 7 |
| 4 | 4 – 8 | 3 – 5 | 2 – 6 | 1 – 7 |
| 5 | 5 – 8 | 4 – 6 | 3 – 7 | 1 – 2 |
| 6 | 6 – 8 | 5 – 7 | 1 – 4 | 2 – 3 |
| 7 | 7 – 8 | 1 – 6 | 2 – 5 | 3 – 4 |
Odd number of players? Take the plan for the next even number and replace the highest number with “bye”. For 5 players, you use the plan for 6: whoever is drawn against number 6 in a round sits out. That way every player has exactly one bye over the whole tournament. How to score the bye is covered in the article Tournament Rules Nobody Argues With: Byes, Cancellations, Ties.
With more than eight players, a round robin quickly gets too long. Then groups followed by a knockout stage, or the Swiss system – where you decide the number of rounds yourself – are worth considering.
Step 5: Keep Track of Results and Rankings
Before you start, decide how the ranking is sorted and what happens in the event of a tie. A proven approach: wins count first. If two players are level, their head-to-head decides. If three or more are level, set difference and then point difference apply first, because a head-to-head comparison often goes round in circles there. Club Turnier Manager calculates it exactly this way – details in the article Tournament Rules Nobody Argues With: Byes, Cancellations, Ties.
Excel Template or Tournament App?
Excel templates for tournament schedules are popular, and for a small round robin with a fixed field they work well. It gets tricky as soon as the tournament doesn't go to plan: someone cancels at short notice, a player arrives late, or you want to draw new doubles partners every round. Then formulas need adjusting – often on a laptop at the side of the court.
| Excel template | Tournament app | |
|---|---|---|
| Fixed schedule, small group | works well | works well |
| Rotating doubles partners | laborious | automatic |
| Dropout mid-tournament | adjust formulas | substitute takes over place and statistics |
| Swiss system, Mexicano | hardly feasible | automatic |
| Ranking | error-prone | always up to date |
For more on how much software a club tournament really needs, read the article Professional Tournament Software or a Simple App?
Print or Display the Schedule
In many halls, the tournament schedule still hangs on the wall. Club Turnier Manager prints the fixtures, match history and knockout bracket directly and exports the ranking as a PDF for the noticeboard. If you have a projector or a second screen, the hall display shows courts, names and results during the round and the current ranking between rounds.
A Tournament Schedule in Minutes
Choose the format, enter the players, set the courts – Club Turnier Manager creates the schedule, draws fairly and keeps the ranking. Offline in the browser, no sign-up and no installation – the test version is free.
Try It NowConclusion
A good tournament schedule doesn't start with Excel but with four questions: how many are playing, on how many courts, for how long and for what purpose? The right format, the number of rounds and the fixtures follow from that. For small groups, the plans above work fine on paper. As soon as partners rotate, players drop out or the ranking needs to run live, a tournament app saves you a lot of work.