What is Buchholz in chess?

The sum of the final scores of a player's opponents. Buchholz Cut-1 leaves out the lowest of those scores; Median Buchholz leaves out the lowest and the highest. A higher Buchholz means stronger opposition.

What is Sonneborn-Berger?

For each game, the opponent's final score multiplied by the points scored against them, added up: a full win counts the whole score, a draw half of it, a loss nothing. It rewards results against the players who finished high.

How are byes and forfeits counted?

Under the FIDE rules effective 1 March 2026 (Article 16), a player's own unplayed round is valued as a game against a dummy opponent with the player's own score, capped for a forfeit at the scheduled opponent's score. For opponents' tie-breaks, unplayed rounds count with the points awarded, except a requested bye in the last round or followed only by absences, which counts as a draw.

How does direct encounter work?

Among the players still tied, the points each scored in games against the others decide, if they all played each other. If not all of them met, it separates a player only when that player would be ahead whatever the missing games had been. Forfeits do not count.

Can I use it for a round robin?

The FIDE regulations say Buchholz-type tie-breaks must not be used in round robins. There, use direct encounter, Sonneborn-Berger and number of wins, which this page also works out.

Chess Tiebreak Calculator

Free tool · No account needed

Enter the crosstable, get every tie-break and the final ranking. Runs in your browser. Nothing is uploaded.

When players finish on the same points, a Swiss tournament is ranked by tie-breaks. Enter each player's results round by round, or paste a crosstable, and this page works out points, Buchholz, Buchholz Cut-1, Median Buchholz, Sonneborn-Berger, direct encounter and the number of wins, then ranks the players in the order of tie-breaks you choose. Byes and forfeits follow Article 16 of the FIDE Tie-Break Regulations effective 1 March 2026: a player's own unplayed round counts as a game against a dummy opponent with the player's own score, and a requested bye at the end of the event counts as a draw for the opponents' Buchholz. The older virtual-opponent rule is available for events run under it.

What this tool does

The usual Swiss tie-breaks

Buchholz, Buchholz Cut-1, Median Buchholz, Sonneborn-Berger, direct encounter and number of wins, side by side for every player.

Byes and forfeits by the rules

Pairing-allocated and requested byes, forfeit wins and losses and absences are valued as FIDE Article 16 says, with Cut-1 taking a voluntary unplayed round first.

Your order of tie-breaks

Switch tie-breaks on or off and move them up or down to match the tournament regulations. Ties left after all of them share a rank.

Checks the crosstable

A game entered differently for the two players, or an opponent missing from the table, is pointed out. Copy the standings as CSV for a spreadsheet.

How to calculate chess tie-breaks

1
Enter each player's name and one cell per round, such as 12w1 for a win with White against player 12, or paste a crosstable.
2
Mark byes and forfeits: + for a pairing bye, H for a half-point bye, - for an absence, 9+ or 9- for a forfeit.
3
Choose the tie-breaks and their order as the tournament regulations list them.
4
Read the ranked standings and copy or download them as CSV.

Frequently asked questions

What is Buchholz in chess?: The sum of the final scores of a player's opponents. Buchholz Cut-1 leaves out the lowest of those scores; Median Buchholz leaves out the lowest and the highest. A higher Buchholz means stronger opposition.
What is Sonneborn-Berger?: For each game, the opponent's final score multiplied by the points scored against them, added up: a full win counts the whole score, a draw half of it, a loss nothing. It rewards results against the players who finished high.
How are byes and forfeits counted?: Under the FIDE rules effective 1 March 2026 (Article 16), a player's own unplayed round is valued as a game against a dummy opponent with the player's own score, capped for a forfeit at the scheduled opponent's score. For opponents' tie-breaks, unplayed rounds count with the points awarded, except a requested bye in the last round or followed only by absences, which counts as a draw.
How does direct encounter work?: Among the players still tied, the points each scored in games against the others decide, if they all played each other. If not all of them met, it separates a player only when that player would be ahead whatever the missing games had been. Forfeits do not count.
Can I use it for a round robin?: The FIDE regulations say Buchholz-type tie-breaks must not be used in round robins. There, use direct encounter, Sonneborn-Berger and number of wins, which this page also works out.

The round's games are on paper

Photograph the scoresheets of a round and ScanChess reads each game into a PGN for the tournament archive. A scoresheet scan costs 2 credits; new accounts get 10 free.

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