How to organise a badminton tournament: a step-by-step guide for clubs

Step 1: Decide who it’s for

Before dates and halls, answer three questions. They decide everything else.

• Who can enter? Club members only, or open to anyone? Adults, juniors, or both?
• Which events? Men’s and women’s singles, doubles and mixed doubles are the classic five. For a first tournament, one or two events is plenty: a doubles event fills courts fastest, with four players per match.
• What level? An open event will be won by the strongest player in the area. If you want beginners and improvers to come, run separate level bands, or a plate competition for first-round losers.

Step 2: Choose a format

For group tie-breaks, the usual order is matches won, then the result between the tied players, then game difference, then point difference. Publish it before the day.

Step 3: Choose the scoring

Standard badminton scoring is best of three games to 15, the BWF’s 3×15 system from January 2027. It uses rally scoring: a point on every rally, a game must be won by two clear points, capped at 21, with a short interval when the leader reaches 8. If the calculator below says your day is too long, shorten the matches before you cut entries; if you have courts to spare, play longer ones:

• Best of three to 21: the traditional format, capped at 30, about 40% longer.
• One game to 21: fast, good for group stages, with best of three kept for the knockout.
• Sudden death: the first to the target wins with no deuce, which stops one long deuce holding up a court.

GameOnn supports all of these: best of 1, 3, 5 or 7, games to 11, 15, 21, 30 or any number, and an optional sudden-death rule. The scorer only taps who won each rally; GameOnn handles serve, game and match.

Step 4: Work out how long it will take

This is the step most first-time organisers skip, and the reason so many club tournaments finish after dark. Put in your numbers:

If the answer is too long, the levers are, in order: more courts, shorter matches, fewer entries. Set an entry cap from the calculator before you open entries. Turning people away later is much harder.

Step 5: Book the hall and the kit

The hall

Book the hall for an hour before the first match and at least an hour after your estimated final. Check the number of courts, the ceiling height, and that there’s space outside the courts for a desk and waiting players. The court dimensions guide has the space each court needs, and the set-up guide shows a tournament hall layout.

The kit

• Shuttles. Decide feather or plastic and say so in the entry details. Feather shuttles break quickly in competitive play, so buy more than you think and keep them at the desk.
• Nets and posts for every court, checked at 1.55 m before play starts.
• Phones for scoring, one per court, charged, with a charger at the desk.
• Court number signs big enough to read from the desk.
• First-aid kit, an ice pack and someone who knows where they are.
• Prizes for winners and runners-up of each event.

The people

One person can’t run the desk and fix problems at the same time. For four courts, plan on a tournament referee (makes decisions, keeps time), a desk (check-in, calling matches, shuttles), and players or volunteers scoring each court. In club events, the loser of the previous match on a court usually scores the next one.

Step 6: Take entries

Paper sign-up sheets and group-chat lists are where entries get lost. Decide the entry fee, the deadline and the cap, then take entries in one place. On GameOnn:

1. Create the tournament. Name, singles or doubles, the number of courts, and the scoring from Step 3. Under Location, paste a Google Maps link to the venue; the tournament page then shows it on a map.
2. Turn on the invite link. In Manage → Players → Invite link, switch it on and choose Make public. The tournament page now has a Request to join button.
3. Tell players what they need to know. Add a Notice for players: fee, how to pay, check-in time, shuttles. Tick Ask players for contact details if you’ll need to reach them.
4. Mark the tournament Upcoming. Requests are taken while it’s Upcoming or Live. Everyone who follows you on GameOnn gets an email with the link, and you can share it anywhere else.
5. Accept players. Requests arrive under Join requests. Accepted players go straight into the player list; doubles requests come with the partner already named.

Once it’s Upcoming, the tournament is also listed under upcoming tournaments on GameOnn’s home page, where players looking for badminton near them find it.

Step 7: Make the draw

In a knockout with a number of entries that isn’t 4, 8, 16 or 32, some players get a bye into round two. With 12 entries, for example, four players get byes and eight play in the first round. If you seed the draw, spread the strongest players so they can only meet late: seeds 1 and 2 in opposite halves, 3 and 4 in the remaining quarters.

GameOnn has two ways to build the matches:

• Fixture: GameOnn draws a knockout bracket at random, numbers the matches, spreads them across your courts and moves winners on automatically. Late entries can still be slotted into the draw.
• Manual matches: you create the rounds and matches yourself and set the order on each court. Use it for groups, everyone-plays-everyone, a seeded draw or any format of your own.

Either way, the full draw is public the moment it exists, so players can see who they play and roughly when, and share the link with family.

Step 8: Run the day

Live scores: the thing that keeps it on time

The slowest part of a tournament without software is the walk: players to the desk with a score, the desk to the wall chart, the next players to the chart to find out if they’re on. With GameOnn, each court is scored on a phone, one tap per rally, and everything else updates by itself:

• Winners move into their next match the moment a match ends.
• The tournament page shows what’s on now and what’s up next, so players don’t crowd the desk.
• Parents, friends and club members follow every rally from their own phones, with no account needed.
• Helpers can score too: add them as collaborators with Can edit access.

Want it on YouTube as well? The live streaming guide adds a camera and a live scoreboard overlay to the same setup.

Step 9: After the final

• Post the results while people still care, the same evening. On GameOnn they already are: the draw, every scorecard and the champion stay on the tournament page, and the event moves to past tournaments.
• Thank the helpers and the venue by name.
• Ask for feedback: what ran late, what players would change.
• Announce the next one. Players who follow you on GameOnn hear about it as soon as you open entries.

Organiser’s checklist

4–8 weeks before

• Events, level and format decided
• Duration worked out and entry cap set
• Hall booked, with an hour either side
• Tournament created, venue added, entries open

1 week before

• Entries closed, draw made and published
• Shuttles, prizes and first-aid kit sorted
• Helpers confirmed and given scoring access
• Check-in time and order of play sent to players

On the day

• Courts, nets and court numbers set up
• A charged phone scoring on every court
• Briefing given, first matches on
• Results final, prizes given, photos taken