31st European Youth Go Championships 2026

Plitvice Lakes, Croatia
March 25-28(29), 2026

News

29th March 2026: Semifinals of the 1st EGF Youth Teams Cup started this morning: Croatia is playing Romania (who won the preliminary match against Austria on Saturday evening). Ukraine is playing Czechia. The finals and small finals are scheduled for 14:00 CET. The games are broadcast on OGS with EGF Twitch commentary starting 40 minutes after the beginning of the round.

26th March 2026: All information is available in the Google Sheet: EYGC 2026 – Starting Lists, Pairings, Results, Standings . Seven games from top groups are broadcast on Online Go Server and visible on GoGamesLive.eu

27th March 2026: PairGo @ EYGC Finals broadcast: Sara-Maria Ghetu & Davide Bernardis vs. Lilly Hu with Stjepan Medak, Small Finals: Cherry Hu & Roko Crvelin vs. Vira Chernova & Karlo Vlahovic . Winners are Sara-Maria Ghetu and Davide Bernardis!

27th March 2026: In the evening stay tuned for the semi-finals and finals of the PairGo tournament, supported by Pandanet. PairGo at EYGC started in Croatia in 2020, and it became the standard event ever since, even in 2021 (Online EYGC). Of course, games will be live transmited on Pandanet (and on OGS). On Thursday, 20 pairs played the qualification games and four pairs emerged as semi-finalists: Sara-Maria Ghetu with Davide Bernardis, Cherry Hu with Roko Crvelin, Vira Chernova with Karlo Vlahovic, and Lilly Hu with Stjepan Medak. Games on OGS: https://online-go.com/review/1666063 and https://online-go.com/review/1666064

27th March 2026: All planned activities within EYGC are running very well, but – due to the extreme snowfall during last night (which is preventing several small groups to reach timely reach the venue) – the start of the Round 3 will be delayed to 10:30 AM CET. Consequently the start of the Round 4 will be shifted to 15:00.

25th March 2026: The opening ceremony went as planned in presence of the honorable guests from the local community and more than 150 players, parents, coaches and visitors. The cultural programme was amazing and the tournament has been officially opened. In the evening we had a Team Leaders meeting. All groups arrived timely and everything was set-up for timely start of Round 1 on Thursday at 10:00 AM.

25th March 2026: Registration desk in front of the Congress Hall of the hotel Jezero will be opened at 15:00 (Wednesday). Opening Ceremony begins at 18:00.

22nd March 2026: Boarding is almost completed. We expect sunny arrival and opening ceremony on Wednesday with temperatures around 15 degrees Celsius, and then – snow on Thursday with temperatures around zero! Please, be aware of weather conditions. 

16th March 2026: We are now finishing printed badges and goodies for timely registered participants – we cannot guarantee the materials for players who register after 17th March 2026. In addition, refer to Rules and Regulations in advance – team leaders should explain the details to players.

12th March 2026: (updated 25th March) We have 129 registered players from 14 countries: 48 in the U12 group, 50 in U16 and 31 in U21 group. You can check the interactive map with number of participants per country. It is almost last moment to register, or – if you are registered and did not pay the registration fee – to answer messages from the organizers.

 

We have 5 teams registered for the 1st EGF Youth Teams Cup: Austria, Croatia, Czechia, Romania and Ukraine (in alphabetical order). More details on Teams Cup page.

28th February 2026: Today is the last day for registration and payment of “Normal fee” (40 EUR per player). As of Sunday, 1st March 2026, the “Sleeping Bears fee” (50 EUR per player) will be applied. At the same time we have 110 registered players and the numbers will be rising …

 

The number of countries registered for the 1st EGF Teams Cup is currently 5.

15th February 2026: We have 100 registered participants from 15 countries!

 

IMPORTANT: By 28th February 2026: 

 

Many players expressed the interest for playing PairGo. Please contact your partner and complete the registration by filling the form.

 

We are happy to announce three go teachers who are going to review games of young players at the venue.

 

In addition, top games from each age group will be broadcast live and reviewed on the EGF Twitch Channel.

29th January 2026: Tomorrow is the last working day for registration and payment of Early Birds fee (30 EUR). As of Sunday, 1st February 2026, the Normal fee (40 EUR) will be applied. Exceptionally, players born in 2005 can register and pay the Early Birds fee by Saturday, 14th February 2026.

28th January 2026: The GLOBIS Cup is back! The prestigious youth tournament will be held in Tokyo between 25th and 29th June 2026. European go federation shall nominate the representative immediately  after EYGC. It is going to be the winner of the U21 tournament. Stay tuned for more details on the EGF website.

12th January 2026: The details about travelling from the Zagreb Airport to the playing site are added to the Venue page. 

5th January 2026: The payment details are published on the Registration page – the deadline for payment of Early Birds registration fees is 31st January 2026.

30th December 2025: We are thankful to all EGF-members who expressed their intention to participate in the 1st EGF Youth Teams Cup, to be held on 29th March 2026. The registration form is ready..

9th December 2025: We added the “live” lists of registered participants sorted by actual rating to the Registration page: U12, U16, and U20. Ratings will be updated every week.

25th November 2025: Since 2020, PairGo is a regular event at EYGC. We added the “Side-event” page describing the PairGo tournament system. Players who are interested should mark the checkbox “PairGo” when registering. Finding a partner a long before coming to EYGC is an important task.

13th November 2025: The registration of individual EYGC 2026 is now open. Players compete for trophies, medals and very interesting prizes. The tournament results of EYGC 2026 and EYGC 2027 will be combined to determine nominations for WYGC 2027. After the EYGC finishes on Saturday, March 28, 2026, a new team event will be played on Sunday, March 29, 2026: EGF Youth Teams Cup

 

4th November 2025: European Youth Go Championships 2026 will be held in Croatia, National Park Plitvice Lakes, the most famous national park in Croatia, 140 km south from Zagreb. Croatian Go Alliance will be providing updated information about the schedule, registration, accommodation and travelling information for all participants and accompanying persons. The tournament is supported by European Go Federation, under the patronage of Croatian Olympic Committee.

 

9th October 2025: We have re-started the preparation of 31st European Youth Go Championships, to be held in Jezero hotel Congress centre, Plitvice Lakes.

17th March 2020, 9 PM: The EYGC 2020 video: https://youtu.be/Qy-_wisiFq8

About EYGC

European Youth Go Championships is the top European youth tournament held for the first time in 1996 in Baile Felix, Romania. The results of all tournaments since then are available in the European Go Database. A nice overview can be found at the website of European Go Federation:

 

https://www.eurogofed.org/results/#eygc

 

The tournaments in the age groups U12 and U16 are the part of the World Youth Go Championships, sponsored by Ing Foundation, which has a long history, starting in 1984:

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/World_Youth_Go_Championship

 

The U20 tournament of EYGC was the qualification for the GLOBIS Cup, a prestigious tournament held 10 times between 2014 and 2023 in Japan, organized by Nihon ki-in. The GLOBIS Cup is now back!!

 

A beautiful work of art showing the history of EYGC has been prepared for the previous edition of EYGC, held in Moscow in May 2019:

 

History of European Youth Championships – Amazing Sand Painting

 

EYGC participants by country

 

Go sets in the Congress Hall

Stones - Waterfalls