The EGF is a non-profit organization with the purpose of encouraging, regulating, co-ordinating and disseminating the playing of Go in Europe. It has a history of more than fifty years of organising congresses, championships, tournaments and leagues throughout Europe.
Membership is open to the Go organising body in any country in, or near to, Europe. As of 2018 there were 37 members and the number continues to grow.
Each year the Annual General Meeting (AGM) is held, as part of the European Go Congress (EGC) at the end of July/start of August, in one of the member countries. Among other business, an Executive Committee is elected for running normal activities between AGMs.
Under Executive Committee supervision, there is a number of commissions. Each commission is supervised by Executive Committee member and is responsible for collecting and analysing events and proposals from their field and submitting their conclusions for the approval of the Executive or Annual General Meeting.
The EGC is the premier event of the European Go calendar and as well as featuring the European Championship, has tournaments and teaching that all can join in. It brings together all kinds of Go players, competitive and recreational, young and old, from all over the world as well as all around Europe. It can attract up to a thousand attendees.
Reflecting the increased level of play over the last twenty years, annual European Championships are now also held for particular groups of players. These events are held at various times during the year and in different locations each year. There are Championships for Youth, Students, Women, Pairs, Teams and Pros.
The annual country Team Championship is run as leagues, online on Pandanet, with finals at the EGC, thanks to the sponsor Pandanet.
The EGF coordinates major European tournaments and many of these are part of a Grand Prix. Over the years various sponsors have supported tournaments for the very best players, often to select players to take part in pro events in the Orient. Currently these events are the Grand Slam Tournaments and the Professional Qualification Tournament. Previous sponsors of events have been Fujitsu, Toyota, Denso, Ing foundation and Pandanet.
In 2012 the EGF ran the Go events at the World Mind Sports Games in Lille, France.
Since 2014 two new professionals have been appointed each year to a European Professional System and the EGF Academy has been set up in cooperation with the Ge Yuhong Go Academy in China.
An official European Rating List is maintained by the European Go Database, by processing the results of as many European tournaments as possible.
Go is maybe 3000 years old and started in China. It spread to Korea and Japan, where as a professional today you could earn a million dollars a year. It is now spreading throughout the rest of the world.
You can play Go online 24/7 on the Pandanet Internet Go Server, used regularly for the Pandanet European Team Go Championships.