About SportsBracket
Bracket planning for organizers who need the numbers before the draw.
SportsBracket is built for tournament organisers who need to understand a competition before they commit to a format. Start with the estimator to get accurate match counts, then build and share the bracket, export a PDF, and manage your event checklist — all in one place.
Contact
Djuprännilen 351
Sweden
Phone support is not available. Email is the best way to reach us.
The person behind SportsBracket
Roger Aspelin
Certified Judo Competition Manager · Stockholm, Sweden
Judo came into Roger's life through his two sons, who started training at IK Södra Stockholm about fifteen years ago. Both went on to earn black belts and compete at national level. The younger is still active in competition; the older has stayed connected to the sport.
Along the way, Roger moved deeper into the organisational side. As a certified judo competition manager he has been responsible for more than 150 events — somewhere in the range of 40,000 to 60,000 competitors — including national championship events and European Cups in Sweden and Finland. The largest event under his sole responsibility had 620 participants; he has also worked as head of technology at events exceeding 700.
SportsBracket fills the gaps he kept running into. Tournament systems handle draws and results well, but three questions always came back: How long will today actually take? What did this event cost, and what should we charge next year? Where is the master checklist? Those three gaps — time estimation, budget, checklists — became the first features.
150+
Events managed
~50k
Competitors
2×
European Cups
3×
National championships
Outside judo and tournament planning, Roger works as a product manager. He has a mild obsession with automation — his home runs on a Raspberry Pi. Naturally.
SportsBracket is an independent project. It is not affiliated with or endorsed by the Swedish Judo Federation, the International Judo Federation, or any other sports organisation.
What you can use today
- Estimate match count, round count and byes for any sport, format and participant count.
- Judo-specific IJF competition systems: quarter-final repechage, double repechage, full repechage, and low-number pool systems.
- Bracket creation with up to 16 participants free, unlimited on Pro — with live shareable bracket links.
- PDF export for print-ready bracket sheets suitable for weigh-in tables, walls and officials.
- Event checklists with 6 built-in templates, shareable and collaborative.
- Planning guides covering single elimination, double elimination, round robin, repechage, seeding and more.
- Rules summaries for IJF judo and national federations with official source links.
What we are building toward
- More verified sports and national rulesets, with source links and organiser overrides.
- Club management — multiple organisers under one account with shared brackets and checklists.
- Additional bracket formats: full repechage (IJF 2.5.4), Swiss, and custom pool structures.
- Scoreboard and live display tools for mats, screens and event day staff.
- Club branding on exported PDFs and shared bracket pages.
Why start with the calculator?
The hard part of tournament software is not drawing boxes. It is knowing which boxes should exist for the chosen sport, ruleset and number of participants.
A small category might need pools. A senior judo category might use quarter-final repechage. A custom event might need organiser-defined rules. The estimator makes those choices visible before you commit.
Once the math is trustworthy, full bracket creation, PDFs and live display can be built on top of the same model — instead of guessed by hand at every event.
Built from real event experience
SportsBracket is developed in Stockholm by Roger Aspelin, a certified judo competition manager who has run events from small club championships up to European Cups — across multiple age groups, weight categories and competition formats.
The planning guides are written from that hands-on experience: repechage formats, weight categories per age group, mat planning with referee constraints and rest periods, and the practical differences between competition systems at various athlete counts. IJF Sport and Organisation Rules are used as a reference source.
When something is wrong, it gets fixed. Every guide page has a Report an inaccuracy button in the page footer — use it to flag incorrect information, outdated content, or unclear explanations. Real-world corrections from working organisers are always welcome.
Tools & services we use
What SportsBracket is built on. Links marked with ✦ are referral links — no extra cost to you, and we may receive a small credit.
Our production server runs on Hostinger VPS — reliable, affordable and easy to manage. Good starting point for clubs wanting to self-host tools.
European cloud servers with transparent pricing and no hidden egress fees. GDPR-friendly. New accounts get €20 in credits.
Handles all subscriptions and payments on SportsBracket. Reliable, well-documented and available across Europe.
Open-source relational database that powers all event, bracket and user data on SportsBracket.
Used throughout development for code review, architecture decisions and writing. Available as a coding assistant via Claude Code.
Free, open-source editor with excellent TypeScript and Next.js support. Works seamlessly over Remote SSH for development on a Linux server.
Explore
Bracket formats
Compare single elimination, repechage and round robin.
Planning guides
Step-by-step guides for running judo and combat sports tournaments.
Sport hubs
Sport-specific tools, weight categories and guides for judo, taekwondo and more.
Pricing
Free for small events. Pro and Club plans for larger tournaments.