Enabling Online Registration
Online registration lets competitors, parents and coaches sign up from their own devices instead of you typing every entry by hand. Registration is tied to your tournament's published status: a draft tournament is invisible to the public, and publishing it opens registration automatically.
Publishing opens registration
When you click Publish Tournament, your event appears on its public page and in the tournament directory, and registration opens at the same time. There is no separate "enable registration" step for a new tournament. Publish and you're live.
Zero credits required to open: registrations are accepted regardless of your credit balance. Credits are only needed later, when you approve competitors.
Opening and closing manually
After publishing, you can pause registration at any time without unpublishing the tournament. In the Tournament Manager, use the Close Registration / Open Registration control. Closing registration keeps your public page visible; people just can't submit new entries. Use it when you hit venue capacity or want to freeze the roster before generating brackets.
Registration deadline
Set a Registration Deadline when creating the tournament or later under Settings → Tournament Info. The deadline runs to the end of that day in your tournament's time zone. After that, new online registrations are rejected automatically.
Leave the deadline blank if you prefer to close registration by hand. On a multi-day tournament with no deadline, registration stays open until the last tournament day, so people can still add a category on site.
Choosing how people pay
Pick the payment mode for each tournament under Settings → Payment, in Payment Mode for This Tournament, then click Save Payment Mode:
| Mode | What happens |
|---|---|
| Online card payments | People pay by card at checkout and the money goes to your own Stripe account. Connect Stripe on the same page (Get paid with Stripe) or add your Stripe keys. Until Stripe is connected, online checkout can't take payments. |
| Cash / Offline | No online payment. The checkout button reads Continue, the registration is created as Unpaid, and you collect the money yourself (cash, bank transfer, at the desk). |
With online card payments you can also let people register first and pay later. Under Settings → Tournament Info, tick Allow competitors to register without upfront payment. Checkout then shows Register plus Pay Now Instead, and you can add an optional Pay-Later Disclaimer that people must accept.
Tip: every registration still uses one credit when you approve it, however the competitor pays you. The credit system is independent of payments.
One account for every role
Everyone signs in with one Taikai App account. At sign-up they pick what describes them: Competitor, Parent, Coach, Judge or Staff. That first choice is not a lock. The same person can compete, coach and judge at the same tournament without a second account.
On your tournament's registration page, the My participation card shows every role the account holds there, each with its status (Approved, Pending, Declined) and a View badge link once approved. It also offers the roles they don't hold yet: Register my dojo, Apply as judge and Join as staff. Judge and staff applications land in your approvals list as usual.
What registrants see
People reach your registration page from the public tournament page's Register Now button. The flow:
- Sign in or create an account. Every registration is tied to an account.
- Who's Competing? The account's profiles are listed. A coach also sees the approved members of their dojo. + Add a profile opens the competitor form; Save and add another saves and opens a blank form with the same dojo.
- Select Events. Each competitor sees only the events they are eligible for, with prices and a running subtotal. If you run team events or allow competing up a category, those sections appear here too (see Team events and Competing up a category).
- Register several at once. With two or more profiles, this grid shows one row per competitor and one column per individual event. Tick the boxes (or a whole column) and add everyone to the cart in one step.
- Review & Pay. The cart lists each competitor, their events and prices, any automatic discounts, and a Discount code field. They accept the waiver, then press Pay Now, Register or Continue depending on your payment mode.
- Registration Complete! The confirmation lists what was entered. If money is still owed, it shows how to pay.
The cart is kept in that browser for the signed-in account for three days, so a reload or a closed tab doesn't lose it. It clears at checkout or sign-out.
The registration then appears in your Tournament Manager, ready for approval. See Approving and unapproving competitors.
Adding a competitor and their photo
From the account page (My Profiles or My Dojo), + Add Profile opens a guided flow with one question per screen: name, date of birth, gender, rank (or belt color), years of training, weight, email, photo and dojo. Weight can be skipped with I'll add it later if the competitor only does kata. At the end, Add another competitor starts the next one with the same dojo already filled in; Done closes the flow.
The email step decides where notices go: the competitor's own email, the account holder's email, or none (the coach hands over the badge on event day).
Photo fields offer Take photo (the phone camera, or the webcam on a computer) and Choose from photos. Every photo then opens Adjust your photo: drag to move it, zoom in or out, rotate if it came in sideways, then Use photo. The photo is used on the competitor's badge.
Checks that prevent mistakes
- Same person twice. Creating a profile warns when the same person (first name, first surname and date of birth) already exists, and says who registered them. Checkout refuses a competitor who is already registered in the tournament under another profile, or appears twice in the cart. Twins differ by first name and are not affected.
- Birth date. A date of birth less than one year ago is rejected. This catches a date picker left on today's date.
- Weight for kumite. Any event whose categories are split by weight needs the competitor's weight. The event shows Weight missing with a link to add it.
- All problems at once. When several competitors are in the cart, checkout reports every problem together and marks each affected competitor, instead of stopping at the first error.
Emails and notices
- The registrant gets the confirmation email with the total, discounts and amount due.
- Each registered competitor also gets an email at their own address (or their guardian's, for minors) saying who registered them and for which events. It contains no prices.
- Bracket notices go to the registrant and to the competitor's own account when their division's bracket is published.
The site, emails and notices follow each person's language. The globe menu switches between English, Spanish and French, and the choice is saved to the account.
Bank transfer events: Taikai App can show your own payment instructions (for example, bank details) on the confirmation screen, in the confirmation email and in the registrant's account, with a Send proof of payment button that opens their email app addressed to you. Write your text in Settings › Pricing › Payment Instructions. The button goes to the Email for payment receipts you set there, or to the first email address in your text if you leave it empty.
Payment statuses
Each competitor in your Competitors list carries a payment status. Click the status badge to move it to the next one. Changing it needs the director, or a staff role with the Manage payments permission.
| Status | Meaning |
|---|---|
| Unpaid | Nothing received yet. |
| Cash Due | Registered with pay later; collect at the venue. |
| Pays at event | Will pay on site. Any discount they have now is locked in, even after its deadline. See Discounts and codes. |
| Partial | Part of the amount received. |
| Paid | Fully paid. Marking an entry paid also freezes its discount. |
| Waived | Free entry, for staff family, special guests or scholarships. |
The payment filter above the list (Owes money, Unpaid, Pays at event and so on) and the CSV export help you chase what is outstanding.