A photo contest should take an afternoon to set up, not a procurement process. Here is the exact setup for an invite-only workplace contest — no registration page, no entry fees, no roster — with company-domain voting and a Best in Show finale.
No signup required. Just enter teams and get a printable PDF bracket instantly.
Most contest and bracket tools were built for sport tournaments, and their model assumes a paying participant: create an event, publish a registration page, set an entry fee, build a player roster, and only then can anyone submit a photo.
For an internal contest, every one of those steps is friction with no upside: you are not collecting fees, you already know who works here, and nobody wants one more account. The contest dies at the signup step.
Brakto voting contests work differently. They do not use the tournament registration page at all — no registration page, no entry fees, and no player roster signup. Employees sign in to a free Brakto account, open the category poll link you share, and either submit a photo or vote. If you want the feature-level view first, the voting contest software overview covers what the platform does, and the full lifecycle guide walks the whole setup end to end.
This order keeps an internal contest private and frictionless: status and access control first, detail later.
Step 1
Start at the voting contest creator and pick the Leaderboard format — a ranked poll, which is what most photo contests want. You need to be signed in to create it.
Create a voting contestStep 2
Give the contest a name, a description, and a brand colour, then create one category per theme — Cutest Pet, Best Desk Setup, Best Team Selfie. Each category becomes its own poll with its own link.
Step 3
A new contest starts as a Draft, which blocks everyone. Move it to Invite Only: it disappears from public browse and search but works for anyone holding the direct link. That is exactly what an internal contest needs.
Step 4
Either add every entry yourself, or turn on public submissions with organizer approval so employees upload their own photos. With approval on, nothing reaches the ballot until you approve it.
Step 5
In Voting Defaults, choose Registered users only and add your allowed email domain. That gates both submissions and votes behind a company address.
Step 6
Open the Directory, copy the generated announcement with the poll links and voting schedule already in place, and send it. Nothing to hand-assemble.
Invite Only, explained
Invite Only hides the contest from public browse and search, but it still works for anyone with the direct link. For an internal company contest that is the best of both worlds: no outside traffic, no login wall on the contest page itself, and a link you control.
A private link keeps strangers out, but it does not prove that the person voting works for you — links get forwarded. The fix is a two-part voting policy in Voting Defaults:
Voters must sign in to a Brakto account, which also gives you one vote per person per category instead of one per network address.
Add @company.com and both submissions and voting are limited to addresses on that domain.
Together they mean only signed-in employees with your company address can reach the ballot or cast a vote. It also makes the failure self-explanatory: sign in with a different domain and an inline message explains why before you vote — not a silent failure after tapping a photo.
You set these once at the contest level and they apply across categories, so you are not repeating the access rules in every poll. The voting admin panel guide has the detail on Voting Defaults, per-category overrides, and the embed widget.
One giant poll with 60 pet photos is hard to judge and hard to vote on. A better structure is several small categories, each its own poll, and then a finale that pulls the winners forward.
Each category is an independent Leaderboard poll supporting up to 200 entries, and each gets its own voting window — so you can stage the contest instead of running everything at once. A clean pattern for a company pet photo contest:
Cutest Pet
Top 4 advance
Silliest Pet
Top 4 advance
Most Photogenic
Top 4 advance
Most Unique
Top 4 advance
Take the top 4 from each of the 4 categories and you have a 16-entry Best in Show finale. The finale is configured as its own division under the contest finale settings, where you pick the source categories and how many entries advance.
Keep the finale on a separate voting window that opens after the category polls close. That gives you a natural two-act contest: category week, then a short, high-stakes finale where everyone votes again on the finalists.
If you let employees upload their own photos, turn on public submissions with organizer approval. Employees can add up to 5 photos per submission and submit more than once — one entry per pet is fine — but nothing goes live until you approve it.
Approvals happen in the contest admin under Entries, and each category poll shows a Manage entries shortcut with a pending badge when there is review waiting. From there you approve or reject entries, and you can filter by submitter email when you are tracking down a specific person's photos. Approved entries appear on the live poll immediately.
The approval step is where workplace contests either succeed or get embarrassing — a stray whiteboard photo, a mislabelled entry, a duplicate. Ten minutes in Manage entries before the ballot goes live protects the whole thing.
Writing the announcement is the step people put off longest, because it means hand-copying poll links and voting times into an email and hoping none are stale. The contest admin has a Directory that generates a copy-ready employee announcement, with the poll links and voting schedule already filled in from your contest settings.
You paste it into Outlook, Slack, or Teams and send. An embeddable voting widget can also be dropped onto an intranet page so the poll sits next to your other internal comms.
A small team running a single category often fits inside the free 16 entries; a larger office with several categories usually lands in the Contest tier.
No. Voting contests do not use the tournament registration page, so there is no registration page, no entry fees, and no player roster signup. Employees sign in to a free Brakto account, then submit photos and vote on the category poll pages you share.
Yes. Set the contest status to Invite Only. It is hidden from public browse and search, but works for anyone with the direct link you send. That is the normal setup for an internal company contest.
Turn on Registered users only voting and add an allowed email domain such as @company.com. That restricts both submissions and voting to addresses on that domain. If someone signs in with a different domain, they see an inline message before they can vote.
Up to 5 photos per submission, and employees can submit more than once — for example, one entry per pet. Each approved entry is a separate place on the ballot, but voting stays one vote per person per category.
Each category is its own Leaderboard poll and supports up to 200 entries. You can run as many categories as your contest needs.
Yes. Each category is its own poll with its own voting window, and a finale division can pull the top entries forward. A common pattern is taking the top 4 from each of 4 categories into a 16-entry Best in Show finale. Categories and the finale use separate voting windows.
The contest admin has a Directory that generates a copy-ready employee announcement email with the poll links and voting schedule already filled in. You can also drop an embeddable voting widget onto an intranet page. The leaderboard updates live, polling for new data about every 15 seconds.
The Free plan covers up to 16 entries. The Contest tier is $149 for up to 64 entries, and larger contests are handled with a custom quote.
Create an invite-only voting contest in minutes — no registration page, no entry fees, no roster signup. Free for up to 16 entries.
Join thousands of organizers who save hours every tournament with Brakto's automated bracket management.
✓ No credit card required · ✓ Set up in 2 minutes · ✓ Cancel anytime
Join thousands of organizers who save hours every tournament with Brakto's automated bracket management.
✓ No credit card required · ✓ Set up in 2 minutes · ✓ Cancel anytime
Free printable 4-team bracket for quick tournaments.
Read more Bracket TemplatesPerfect size for small tournaments and office competitions.
Read more Bracket TemplatesHandles byes automatically for 10-team tournaments.
Read more Bracket TemplatesIdeal for mid-size leagues and club competitions.
Read moreA photo contest should take an afternoon to set up, not a procurement process. Here is the exact setup for an invite-only workplace contest — no registration page, no entry fees, no roster — with company-domain voting and a Best in Show finale.
No signup required. Just enter teams and get a printable PDF bracket instantly.
Most contest and bracket tools were built for sport tournaments, and their model assumes a paying participant: create an event, publish a registration page, set an entry fee, build a player roster, and only then can anyone submit a photo.
For an internal contest, every one of those steps is friction with no upside: you are not collecting fees, you already know who works here, and nobody wants one more account. The contest dies at the signup step.
Brakto voting contests work differently. They do not use the tournament registration page at all — no registration page, no entry fees, and no player roster signup. Employees sign in to a free Brakto account, open the category poll link you share, and either submit a photo or vote. If you want the feature-level view first, the voting contest software overview covers what the platform does, and the full lifecycle guide walks the whole setup end to end.
This order keeps an internal contest private and frictionless: status and access control first, detail later.
Step 1
Start at the voting contest creator and pick the Leaderboard format — a ranked poll, which is what most photo contests want. You need to be signed in to create it.
Create a voting contestStep 2
Give the contest a name, a description, and a brand colour, then create one category per theme — Cutest Pet, Best Desk Setup, Best Team Selfie. Each category becomes its own poll with its own link.
Step 3
A new contest starts as a Draft, which blocks everyone. Move it to Invite Only: it disappears from public browse and search but works for anyone holding the direct link. That is exactly what an internal contest needs.
Step 4
Either add every entry yourself, or turn on public submissions with organizer approval so employees upload their own photos. With approval on, nothing reaches the ballot until you approve it.
Step 5
In Voting Defaults, choose Registered users only and add your allowed email domain. That gates both submissions and votes behind a company address.
Step 6
Open the Directory, copy the generated announcement with the poll links and voting schedule already in place, and send it. Nothing to hand-assemble.
Invite Only, explained
Invite Only hides the contest from public browse and search, but it still works for anyone with the direct link. For an internal company contest that is the best of both worlds: no outside traffic, no login wall on the contest page itself, and a link you control.
A private link keeps strangers out, but it does not prove that the person voting works for you — links get forwarded. The fix is a two-part voting policy in Voting Defaults:
Voters must sign in to a Brakto account, which also gives you one vote per person per category instead of one per network address.
Add @company.com and both submissions and voting are limited to addresses on that domain.
Together they mean only signed-in employees with your company address can reach the ballot or cast a vote. It also makes the failure self-explanatory: sign in with a different domain and an inline message explains why before you vote — not a silent failure after tapping a photo.
You set these once at the contest level and they apply across categories, so you are not repeating the access rules in every poll. The voting admin panel guide has the detail on Voting Defaults, per-category overrides, and the embed widget.
One giant poll with 60 pet photos is hard to judge and hard to vote on. A better structure is several small categories, each its own poll, and then a finale that pulls the winners forward.
Each category is an independent Leaderboard poll supporting up to 200 entries, and each gets its own voting window — so you can stage the contest instead of running everything at once. A clean pattern for a company pet photo contest:
Cutest Pet
Top 4 advance
Silliest Pet
Top 4 advance
Most Photogenic
Top 4 advance
Most Unique
Top 4 advance
Take the top 4 from each of the 4 categories and you have a 16-entry Best in Show finale. The finale is configured as its own division under the contest finale settings, where you pick the source categories and how many entries advance.
Keep the finale on a separate voting window that opens after the category polls close. That gives you a natural two-act contest: category week, then a short, high-stakes finale where everyone votes again on the finalists.
If you let employees upload their own photos, turn on public submissions with organizer approval. Employees can add up to 5 photos per submission and submit more than once — one entry per pet is fine — but nothing goes live until you approve it.
Approvals happen in the contest admin under Entries, and each category poll shows a Manage entries shortcut with a pending badge when there is review waiting. From there you approve or reject entries, and you can filter by submitter email when you are tracking down a specific person's photos. Approved entries appear on the live poll immediately.
The approval step is where workplace contests either succeed or get embarrassing — a stray whiteboard photo, a mislabelled entry, a duplicate. Ten minutes in Manage entries before the ballot goes live protects the whole thing.
Writing the announcement is the step people put off longest, because it means hand-copying poll links and voting times into an email and hoping none are stale. The contest admin has a Directory that generates a copy-ready employee announcement, with the poll links and voting schedule already filled in from your contest settings.
You paste it into Outlook, Slack, or Teams and send. An embeddable voting widget can also be dropped onto an intranet page so the poll sits next to your other internal comms.
A small team running a single category often fits inside the free 16 entries; a larger office with several categories usually lands in the Contest tier.
No. Voting contests do not use the tournament registration page, so there is no registration page, no entry fees, and no player roster signup. Employees sign in to a free Brakto account, then submit photos and vote on the category poll pages you share.
Yes. Set the contest status to Invite Only. It is hidden from public browse and search, but works for anyone with the direct link you send. That is the normal setup for an internal company contest.
Turn on Registered users only voting and add an allowed email domain such as @company.com. That restricts both submissions and voting to addresses on that domain. If someone signs in with a different domain, they see an inline message before they can vote.
Up to 5 photos per submission, and employees can submit more than once — for example, one entry per pet. Each approved entry is a separate place on the ballot, but voting stays one vote per person per category.
Each category is its own Leaderboard poll and supports up to 200 entries. You can run as many categories as your contest needs.
Yes. Each category is its own poll with its own voting window, and a finale division can pull the top entries forward. A common pattern is taking the top 4 from each of 4 categories into a 16-entry Best in Show finale. Categories and the finale use separate voting windows.
The contest admin has a Directory that generates a copy-ready employee announcement email with the poll links and voting schedule already filled in. You can also drop an embeddable voting widget onto an intranet page. The leaderboard updates live, polling for new data about every 15 seconds.
The Free plan covers up to 16 entries. The Contest tier is $149 for up to 64 entries, and larger contests are handled with a custom quote.
Create an invite-only voting contest in minutes — no registration page, no entry fees, no roster signup. Free for up to 16 entries.
Join thousands of organizers who save hours every tournament with Brakto's automated bracket management.
✓ No credit card required · ✓ Set up in 2 minutes · ✓ Cancel anytime
Join thousands of organizers who save hours every tournament with Brakto's automated bracket management.
✓ No credit card required · ✓ Set up in 2 minutes · ✓ Cancel anytime
Free printable 4-team bracket for quick tournaments.
Read more Bracket TemplatesPerfect size for small tournaments and office competitions.
Read more Bracket TemplatesHandles byes automatically for 10-team tournaments.
Read more Bracket TemplatesIdeal for mid-size leagues and club competitions.
Read more