Competitions — challenge friends and compare sessions

Match Formats

CatchMate Specimen supports two competition formats:

• 1v1 Match — You vs. one opponent (friend or bot)
• Multi-Angler Match — 2 to 16 anglers with a live shared leaderboard

For season-long competition across multiple matches, see the Leagues article.

Live vs. Retrospective Matches

Live Match

A live match runs for a set duration — anything from a few hours to a multi-day session. The countdown clock is shown on your session screen. Audio and haptic alerts fire at match start, half-time, and all-in. The result is finalised when time expires.

Retrospective Match

Link any historical session to a match after the fact. This is particularly useful for specimen fishing where sessions may be planned independently and compared afterwards — for example, comparing two anglers' results from the same lake on the same weekend without pre-arranging it in the app.

Creating a Match

1. Tap the Competitions tab (trophy icon)
2. Tap New Match
3. Choose your format: 1v1 or Multi-Angler
4. Fill in the match details:
   • Name — Optional label (e.g. "Lake X Big Fish Challenge")
   • Venue — Choose from your saved venues or enter a location
   • Duration — Set match length. For overnight or multi-day matches, set duration in hours (e.g. 48 hours)
   • Scoring Method — See Scoring Methods below
5. Add opponents:
   • Friend — Search by username. They receive an in-app invitation
   • Bot — Add an AI opponent. In specimen mode, bots simulate low catch counts with realistic heavy weights, targeting carp, barbel, pike, and tench
6. Tap Create Match

Scoring Methods

Specimen matches typically focus on individual fish quality rather than high catch numbers. The scoring method cannot be changed after creation.

Heaviest Single Fish

Only the single heaviest fish caught by each angler counts. No other catches are included. The angler with the heaviest individual fish wins. Standard format for carp-only challenges and big fish competitions.

Weight

Total grams of all fish caught during the match. Heaviest cumulative weight wins. Suits mixed specimen sessions where bream, tench, barbel, and carp all count.

Points — Standard

Each fish scores 1 point regardless of weight. Available if your match format requires it.

Points — Banded

Different point values for different species groups — carp and barbel could score 5 points while bream and tench score 2. Useful for mixed specimen events where larger species should carry more weight in the result.

Multi-Angler Matches — Live Leaderboard

The live leaderboard shows every angler's running total in real time, updated every 20 seconds. In a specimen match this typically shows:

• Position (1st, 2nd, 3rd, etc.)
• Name
• Running weight or heaviest fish (depending on scoring method)
• Number of fish caught

Specimen match leaderboards move slowly by design — one or two fish may separate anglers at the top. A Heaviest Single Fish match may show no change for hours, then a single 30lb carp completely reshuffles the board.

Match countdown:

• "Match duration: 48:00:00" — shown before fishing starts
• "Time remaining: 46:22:05" — live countdown once you start your session
• "Match over" in red — once time expires

The countdown only starts when you tap Start Fishing on the session timer.

Specimen bots are calibrated for low catch rates and heavy fish. A hard bot in a Heaviest Single Fish match may produce one or two fish across a 24-hour session, but those fish will be appropriately large. Bots are venue-aware — a commercial lake bot will catch more frequently than a river barbel bot.

Invitations

When you invite a friend they receive a notification and an invitation card in their Competitions tab.

• Accept — Added to the leaderboard. Their session links when they start
• Decline — Removed from the match. Replace with another friend or a bot

Matches stay in Pending until the creator begins their session. Friends can join at any point before the match is finalised.

Starting Your Session in a Match

1. Open the competition from the Competitions tab
2. Start your fishing session as normal, or link an existing session
3. Tap Start Fishing on the session timer — this locks in your official start time and begins the match countdown

Important: The countdown anchors to when you tap Start Fishing, not to when the session or competition was created. On long sessions this distinction matters — do not tap Start until you are actually ready to fish.

Match Alerts

• Match start — when the clock begins
• Half-time — at the halfway point of the configured duration
• All-in (5 mins) — five minutes before time expires
• All-in — when the match clock reaches zero

Alerts use both sound and haptic feedback. Configure in Settings → Notifications. On long overnight sessions, consider whether you have alerts set to silent before settling in for the night.

Finalising a Match

Once the match duration has elapsed, the creator taps Finalise Match from the competition detail screen. Final positions are calculated and saved permanently to your competition history and statistics.

For retrospective matches, finalise as soon as all linked sessions are confirmed — there is no countdown to wait for.

Bot Opponents — How They Work in Specimen Mode

Specimen bots are calibrated differently from coarse bots:

• Catch rate — Low. A hard bot on a lake may produce 2–4 fish per 24-hour session
• Species — Carp, barbel, pike, tench, bream, big perch
• Hook size — Larger patterns matching real carp and barbel rigs
• Venue scale — Still waters and rivers produce calibrated weights. Commercial carp venues produce more fish than a quiet estate lake

Difficulty levels: Easy — occasional bites, modest fish; Medium — respectable catches; Hard — consistent near the top of most leaderboards; Expert — rarely outfished.

Bot names reflect their style (e.g. "Carp Angler", "Barbel Specialist") to make the match feel realistic.

Solunar Ratings in Matches

If Solunar is enabled, your session displays a Solunar tile showing feeding activity predictions based on GPS location, date and time, and moon phase. Ratings run from 1 to 5 stars — New Moon and Full Moon phases score highest. For specimen fishing, solunar data is particularly relevant — many seasoned carp and barbel anglers plan their sessions around lunar peaks. Bot opponents also catch more frequently during solunar peak windows. Enable or configure Solunar in Settings → Moon Phases.

Frequently Asked Questions

Can I set a 24 or 48-hour match duration? Yes. Duration is set in hours when creating the match. There is no upper limit that prevents multi-day specimen sessions.

Does "Heaviest Single Fish" count fish logged during the whole session? Yes — the heaviest individual fish logged at any point during the match duration counts. All other fish are irrelevant to the result.

The countdown timer shows "Match duration" but isn't ticking — why? The live countdown only starts when you tap Start Fishing. Before that, the displayed time is the configured match length as a reminder.

Can I link a session I started before creating the competition? Yes — use Retrospective match format. You can link any completed or active session from your history when setting up the competition.

Can I have both friends and bots in the same multi-angler match? Yes. You can mix friends and bots to fill any number of pegs up to the maximum of 16.