How to Play Fantasy American Idol

How do fantasy leagues for American Idol work? Keep reading to learn more!

JOIN A FANTASY LEAGUE

Playing fantasy American Idol has never been more fun.

It’s your favorite time of the year – American Idol time. It’s finally time to see who shines on the stage to advance to the Live Shows and who gets sent packing early. If you’re like us, you’ve thought to yourself, “Wow; it would be so fun to have a game to play along with the show.”

 

Well, it’s here! You can play your own version of American Idol and be a judge from your couch. Bracketology offers three different Fantasy American Idol game types: from creating a basketball-style bracket after the Top 20 round, to picking which contestants are going to survive elimination after each performance; this challenge is on.

Getting started on Bracketology is easy.​

Download the App

The Bracketology app is available for both iOS & Android. Search ‘Bracketology’ in your App Store, or click here to be taken directly in to our web application.

Create an Account

If you’re new to Bracketology, welcome! You’ll need to go through the Account Creation flow to get started. Enter your email & password or Sign in with Google/Apple/Facebook, choose a username, and upload a profile picture. Once you’ve verified your email, you can use your recently created username & password or SSO social account to log in.

Add American Idol to 'Your Shows'

Bracketology offers fantasy gaming for a variety of reality TV shows. If this is your first time using the app, after logging in, you'll be prompted to select your first show. Choose 'American Idol' and you'll be ready to join some leagues. If you have already played fantasy games on Bracketology for another show, use the 'Add Shows' menu in the upper left corner of your app, click the '+" button & add American Idol to your show list.

Let's talk about leagues.

After you’ve added American Idol to Your Shows, you will be automatically added to the Official Bracketology American Idol League. Here, you can compete against American Idol fans site-wide. You also have the option to join or create as many additional leagues as you want. The best part? You can easily submit the same lineup to multiple leagues – no need to remake picks for each one – making it easy to be in as many leagues as you want.

Join Leagues

Once you’re on the Leagues tab, swipe over to the ‘Join Leagues’ section to see all of the Public leagues available to join. 

Create a League

Looking to adopt the role of ‘commissioner’ and create your own league? We love it. Just click the Create New + button and follow the instructions. You’ll be asked to create a league name, description, add a photo for the league icon, and any social links you might want to direct your league-mates to. After, you’ll be prompted to choose up to 3 game types in which your league can compete, as well as decide the privacy of your league (private = invite only, public = searchable in the league directory and anyone can join).

Making your picks.

Don't forget to make picks for all game types!

Every league commissioner can choose up to 2 game types for their league, and if you’re only making picks for one game type, you are only getting partial points. You can submit picks for all game types from your Picks tab, or go into each league to submit a unique lineup. Click on a game type below to learn more about how each one works.

First Impression

After all contestants have been announced, build an elimination-style bracket one time starting at the Top 20 round, guessing who will advance through each Elimination.

Week to Week

Select contestants who you believe will survive the elimination after each round of performances. Receive a uniform number of points for each correct pick.

Confidence Pool

Week to Week, with a twist. Rank how confident you are that each contestant will survive Elimination, assigning your most confident pick to the highest point value.

Make sure your push notifications are turned on.

Can’t score points if you don’t make picks. We do our best to ensure that you don’t forget by sending (a very reasonable amount of) push notifications whenever it’s time to set your lineups. Check your phone settings (Settings > Notifications) and make sure all notifications are turned ON so you receive these important reminders. We’ll also send pick reminders via email, so make sure you are opted-in to receive those, too.

Watch American Idol every Sunday.

Tune in weekly on Sundays to watch American Idol on ABC. Don’t worry though – we’ll do all the fantasy scoring for you so you can just sit back and relax.

Get in on the Conversation

One of the best parts about reality TV is all of the great social content that it inspires. Follow us on Twitter (@bracketologytv), Instagram (@bracketology.tv), and TikTok (@bracketology.tv) to hear our thoughts on each episode, participate in our polls, and more.

Then check your scores!

Scores are generally posted about an hour after the episode ends in Pacific Time. 

View your own scoring breakdown.

Head back over to your Picks tab to see how all of your lineups faired in the episode.

Check your league scoreboards to see how you did.

Within each league, users can view a Total scoreboard that combines all game type scores from within that league into one overall leaderboard. Only making picks for one game type within your league? You can see how you rank on each individual game type scoreboard, too.

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