How are xiangqi tournament pairings decided?
These answers restate the rules implemented by our open-source engine, which follows the WXF laws and is regression-tested against the official 110-diagram repetition casebook. Where an answer refers to a specific position, that position lives on the linked reference page, where the build verifies it against the engine before publishing.
Direct answer
Most xiangqi tournaments use the Swiss system: after each round, players are grouped by their current score and paired against others in the same or a nearby score group, while the pairing software avoids repeat opponents wherever it can. A small event might instead run a straightforward round robin, where everyone plays everyone.
Why Swiss is the common choice
It lets a large field play a manageable number of rounds instead of needing everyone to face everyone, while still producing pairings that get more competitive as the event goes on, since winners keep meeting winners. Colour allocation is also balanced by the software as far as the pairings allow, roughly alternating Red and Black across your rounds.
What a round robin offers instead
Every player meets every other player exactly once, which is fairer in the sense that nothing depends on pairing luck, but it only works for small fields since the number of rounds needed grows quickly with the number of players. Club and small local events use this format more often than large opens do.
Related questions
Can I request not to play someone?
Generally no, except for genuine conflicts of interest; the pairing system is meant to be neutral and automatic.
What happens with an odd number of players in Swiss?
One player in the lowest eligible score group receives a bye for that round, usually worth a result equivalent to a win.
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