How to List Your CTF on CTFtime and Get It Rated

To list your CTF on CTFtime, register an organizer team on ctftime.org and submit your event through its organizer form, with UTC dates, format, official URL and an English description. Only team events are accepted. To earn rating points, the event must also be open to all teams and publish a final scoreboard.

Run your CTFtime-ready event on CTF7. Every event gets a public event page to use as your official URL, open, invite-only or paid registration, team management with team-size limits, and a real-time scoreboard. Host your event or see events running on CTF7.

Key takeaways

• Listed and rated are different bars. Any team-based CTF with English details can be listed. Rating needs an open event with a published final scoreboard.
• Individual-only events can't be listed. Invite-only and high-school events can be listed, but they are not rated.
• Teams vote on an event's weight, so your first edition won't carry as much as established events, whatever its quality.
• No scoreboard, no points. Plan who submits the final standings before the event starts, not after.

CTFtime is a directory, not a host. Its organizer rules can change, so read its For organizers page before you submit.

Why list your CTF on CTFtime

CTFtime is the global CTF calendar and team rating site. It doesn't host challenges or run scoreboards. It lists events, records results and ranks teams on how they place in rated events. If you want experienced teams to find your CTF, it is a natural place to announce it.

A listing gets you:

• Discovery. Your event appears on the upcoming events calendar that players use to plan their weekends.
• A permanent record. Each event page keeps your dates, format, organizer team, official URL and final scoreboard.
• Writeups that outlive the event. Players post writeups against your tasks, so your challenges keep teaching after the scoreboard closes.
• Reach beyond your campus. An open listing can reach far more teams than a poster campaign, including a large local audience if you run an India-based event.

Listed vs rated: two different bars

Many listed events never earn rating points. That's fine, as long as you know which bar you're aiming for.

Team-based only

CTFtime is for team competitions. An individual-only contest, such as a solo hiring assessment or a one-player college qualifier, can't be listed. If you can redesign it so players form teams, even small ones, it becomes a team event. If it stays individual-only, promote it through your own event page, college channels and community groups instead.

Open, not invite-only

Rating goes to open events. Invite-only events and high-school events can appear on the calendar but are not rated. Very long leagues are best split into rounds that each run as their own event with their own scoreboard. More on what this means for college events below.

Weight is voted, not set

Every rated event carries a weight that determines how much it counts toward team ratings. You don't set it. Teams vote on it, and a first edition usually starts modestly. Plan for the second edition: tested challenges, a platform that stayed up, consistent rulings and prompt results give teams a reason to vote it up. Your event's own scoring and CTFtime's rating are separate; CTFtime only looks at your final standings. For in-event scoring, see how CTF scoring works.

What to prepare before you submit

The event form asks for:

• An organizer team on CTFtime. Register your club, chapter or company as a team. The listing names it as the organizer.
• Event name and logo. Use the same name everywhere.
• Start and finish times in UTC. India is UTC+5:30, so a 48-hour CTF from 10:00 IST Saturday to 10:00 IST Monday is 04:30 UTC Saturday to 04:30 UTC Monday.
• Official URL. A stable public event page with rules, registration and contact details. Don't use a link that will move or expire.
• Format. Jeopardy, attack-defense or mixed. Our guide to CTF formats compares them.
• Online or onsite, plus the venue location for onsite rounds.
• Description in English. Categories, difficulty, team size, who can join, prizes and a link to your rules.

Write your rules before the listing goes live. Our CTF rules template covers team size, flag sharing, writeup embargoes and appeals. Pair it with a code of conduct.

Step-by-step: submitting your event

The general flow is covered in our hosting guide. In short:

1. Create an account and organizer team. Use an account your team can keep long term, not one person's throwaway login. Create a team for your club or organization and add co-organizers. This profile is what CTFtime shows as the organizer.
2. Submit the event form. Follow the organizer form's instructions to add your event. Aim for six to eight weeks before the event, in line with the timeline in our hosting guide.
3. Keep the listing current. Update times, URL and description whenever they change. Listings are moderated by humans, so leave time for changes to go through.
4. Run the event. Ask teams to register under their CTFtime team names so results match their profiles.
5. Submit the final scoreboard. After winners are verified, submit the final standings in the format the organizer page describes. Without it, nobody earns rating points.
6. Post tasks and invite writeups. Add your task list so players can attach writeups, and let teams vote on the event's weight.

Getting the final scoreboard right

The final scoreboard is the step organizers most often leave until the last minute, and it's the one rating depends on. Treat it as part of event close:

1. Freeze and verify. Settle every cheating review and disqualification before you publish. Our post on dynamic flags and anti-cheat covers reading submission logs and writing an anti-cheat policy before you need one.
2. Match team names. Check that the names in your standings match the teams' registrations, so points land on the right profiles.
3. Assign an owner. Name one organizer responsible for converting your platform's final standings into the documented format and submitting them.
4. Publish the same results everywhere. Your event page, your announcement and your listing should all show the same ranking.

A note for college organizers: invite-only events

Many college CTFs are invite-only: limited to one campus, to registered fest participants or to a shortlist from an internal round. These can be listed but won't be rated. Tell your team and faculty coordinator early. You have three reasonable options:

• List it anyway. You still get a calendar entry and a permanent results page.
• Add an open online round. Run a round open to every team as its own event, with its own final scoreboard. That round can qualify for rating, while the onsite final stays campus-only.
• Skip the listing for this one. For an internal practice night or a club trial, your own event page and results announcement may be enough.

High-school events follow the same rule: listed, not rated. See CTFs for high school students and, for budgets, approvals and sponsors, how to run a college CTF in India.

Hosting the event itself

CTFtime lists and rates your event, but it doesn't run it. You still need a platform for registration, challenges and the scoreboard. On CTF7, your event gets a public event page to use as the official URL, open, invite-only or paid registration, team management with team-size limits, and a real-time scoreboard with rankings, points, solves and time taken.

Size your plan for an open listing: the Free plan is hosted on CTF7 for jeopardy CTFs of up to 50 participants, and larger or branded events fit Standard or Premium. Compare them on the pricing page, or tell us about your event.

Common reasons an event isn't rated

• It's an individual contest. Allow teams, even small ones.
• It runs as one very long league. Split it into separate rounds.
• It's invite-only. Open a round to everyone if rating matters.
• No final scoreboard was submitted. The easiest one to avoid.
• The details aren't in English. Write them in English, even for a bilingual event.
• The times are wrong. Times entered in IST instead of UTC put your event 5.5 hours off on every team's calendar.

Frequently asked questions