Premier League Darts

Premier League Darts, currently known as BetMGM Premier League Darts for sponsorship purposes, is the Professional Darts Corporation's (PDC) foremost league competition, and part of the trio of coveted "triple crown" tour events.

📜 Premier League Darts History

The Premier League was first staged in 2005 as a 7-player event, and was initially dominated by Phil "The Power" Taylor, who won the first 3 seasons unbeaten. Taylor went on to win another 3 Premier League titles, but other winners include James Wade, Gary Anderson, Michael van Gerwen, and Raymond van Barneveld. Today, the competition includes 8 players who compete weekly, from February to May each year.

Whilst the television appeal of Premier League Darts has always been high – the competition has been broadcast on Sky Sports in the UK since its very first edition – the size of Premier League crowds has increased since 2005. This is reflected in the changing size of the venues which have staged the event’s final night, the play-offs: early host venues included Manchester Central and the Plymouth Pavilions, but more recent host venues include the First Direct Arena in Leeds, the Mercedes-Benz Arena in Berlin, and London’s O2.

💯 Premier League Darts Format & Scoring

BetMGM Premier League Darts was restructured prior to the 2022 season, with changes including a decrease in the total number of competitors from 10 to 8. The same 8 players compete weekly across 17 live events, all hosted in different cities across the UK, Ireland, Germany, and the Netherlands. All nights feature knock-out quarterfinals, semifinals, and a best-of-11-legs final, with the exception of the final play-off night, which includes only the top 4 players, and thus begins at the semifinal stage.

The winner of each weekly Premier League darts event gets £10,000 and 5 ranking points, each runner-up gets 3 ranking points, and each losing semifinalist gets 2; these ranking points are accumulated across the first 16 events, and the players ranked accordingly in the Premier League table. Come the final night of action - the play-offs - the top-4 players fight it out to be crowned Premier League champion!

As well as getting their hands on one of darts' most celebrated trophies, the Premier League champion will also be treated to a large portion of the competition's massive £1,000,000 prize-pot.