A bye in sports and other competitive activities can have two different meanings both of which are indicative that a participant in a competition is not required to compete while most of the other participants are. Its main use is in the context of tournament competitions. In knock-out (single-elimination) tournaments, if the number of participants is not a power of two (e.g. 16 or 32), one of the methods used to make a working bracket are byes which automatically move certain participants into a later round without requiring them to compete in an earlier one. Although it may not be necessary based on the format of the tournament, other types of eliminator tournaments may also include a bye for others reasons, such as to reward the best ranked participant(s).