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General

Bracket World allows you to create custom tournament brackets to share with others and to pick the winners of brackets that others have created.

This guide will take you through the basics of joining a bracket, selecting the winners, and monitoring your ranking as the tournament progresses. It will also cover how to create and share your own custom bracket.

Throughout the pages of the site, you'll see icons like this:  or . Hover over or tap them to reveal helpful tips.

When creating brackets or searching for brackets to join, the dates and corresponding statuses are very important. Here's a guide:

Field What It Means
Registration Start Date/Time When the bracket becomes open for registration
Registration End Date/Time When the bracket closes to further registration
Bracket Start Date The day on which winners can be entered by the bracket creator
Bracket End Date For informational purposes only

Based on today's date, the bracket can be in one of 6 statuses:

Today Is Status
Before Registration Start Date/Time Pending
Between Registration Start and End Date/Time (public bracket) Open
Between Registration Start and End Date/Time (private bracket) Invite Only
After Registration End Date/Time and before Bracket Start Date Closed
Between Bracket Start and End Dates In Progress
After Bracket End Date Completed

When viewing a bracket, the following icons are generally available:

 

Joining Brackets

To make selections for a particular bracket, you first have to search for it and then join it.

 

Searching

Search using keywords from the Bracket World homepage or head over to the Search Brackets page for more options.

You'll also automatically see a list of publicly available brackets that are open for registration.

Featured Brackets are ones that have been created by the Bracket World administrator and will be available for well-known events like the NCAA tournament. Join these if you're looking to play against the most people.

Otherwise, you'll also see a list of all publicly available open brackets created by other Bracket World members.

When viewing a bracket, you'll have the opportunity to join it (assuming it's still open for registration), after which you'll be able to make your selections.

 

Making Selections

After joining a bracket, you'll immediately be able to select the winners of each matchup.

The screen will appear similar to how it looked prior to joining the bracket, but the individual cells are now clickable.

Don't forget to enter in your predicted total score for the championship match. The closest prediction to the actual total score will break a tie between players of the bracket.

Choosing a winner is as simple as clicking on that team's cell to advance it to the next round.

This action can also be done if you change your mind and select a different winner for a given matchup.

Bracket World will take care of clearing out that team you're replacing from any later rounds as well.

You can always come back at a later time to make your selections provided the registration period has not passed — the brackets you've joined will appear on your Bracket World home page under Brackets Joined.

 

Checking Results

Once the registration period for a bracket is over, you'll no longer be able to make selections.

As the bracket creator enters the winners of the matchups (you'll be notified via e-mail when this happens), you can see how you've fared against all other players of the bracket.

When viewing the bracket, click the View Standings button to see a list of all the players and their scores.

 

Creating Brackets

In just 2 easy steps, you'll be on your way to creating a custom bracket that you can open up to the world or just to a few close friends.

To get started, click Create A Bracket from the top navigation and fill out the information:

Next, define the dates of your bracket.

You have the ability to set the dates such that registration is possible up to the minute prior to the beginning of the first game.

As the creator, you're able to enter the winners beginning on the bracket start date.

Remember, you can always click on the  for more information on a specific field.

Defining the number of points per round for a correct selection is important in fostering fun and a competitive environment for the players of your bracket.

A rule of thumb is to double the number of points for a correct selection in each subsequent round. This rewards players for selecting correctly in later rounds.

Care should be taken not to make the difference too extreme so as not to render the earlier rounds insignificant.

Brackets are set to be publicly available by default, but you're welcome to restrict access to only certain players.

Each e-mail entered should correspond to the e-mail used by the player when registering, otherwise they will not be able to access your bracket.

After finalizing your bracket, an e-mail will be sent to these addresses with an invitation to play.

 

Setting Structure

If you have a "perfect" bracket, meaning there are no first-round byes (brackets with 2, 4, 8, 16, 32, 64 or 128 teams) then there's nothing further you need to do with the bracket stucture. Click the Save & Proceed icon to advance to the next step.

Otherwise, you have the option of moving where the first-round byes appear. You would do this if you're arranging a particular matchup of teams or you want a specific look to your bracket.

To move a first-round matchup, simply click on it to reveal the locations where it can be moved.

These open slots will be highlighted.

Click on one of the open slots to place the matchup in that location.

 

Defining Teams

After the bracket structure has been set, the final step is to define the team/participant information.

You'll see the team info entry form when clicking on the Set Info button above each team.

All fields except for the team name are optional, but the more information you can provide, the better decisions the players of your bracket will make.

The form also provides convenient "previous" and "next" options so you don't have to close and open the entry form for each team.

If you accidentally enter team information for the wrong slot, you can swap positions of the teams within the bracket.

Click on a team and then click on another team to swap their positions.

This can be done as often as you like while you're in this step of the bracket creation process.

 

Selecting Winners

On your bracket start date (after the registration end date/time if it's on the same day), you'll be able to set the winners for the matchups in your bracket.

To do this, you'll be making selections in the same manner as a normal player of your bracket. The difference is that when you save your changes, everyone's bracket will be scored against your selections.

Your picks become the "answer key" and everyone who's playing your bracket will be assigned a score based on the point values you specified when the bracket was created.

Click the View Standings button after saving the bracket winners to check the scores of everyone playing your bracket.

 

Setting Preferences

It's important that your e-mail and preferred time zone are up to date in order to have the best experience on Bracket World.

All e-mails for brackets you've joined will be sent to the address you've set up and all registration times will be expressed in the time zone you specify.

This is also the area where you can change your password and security question/answer.

 

Contact Me

If you'd like further assistance, you can always reach out by sending me an e-mail.

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