World Darts Championship 2025/26 Prize Fund | How much is up for grabs at Ally Pally?
The 2025/26 World Darts Championship is the sport’s biggest-ever event, with a record prize fund up for grabs at Alexandra Palace.
Reigning champion Luke Littler heads a world-class field at Alexandra Palace in London for this year’s PDC World Championship.
It’s the climax of the darting year, three weeks of top drama over Christmas and New Year, which has been staged at London’s Ally Pally since 2008.
This year is the 33rd World Darts Championship and the biggest yet, with 128 players taking part – up from 96 – and contesting a record prize fund of £5m.
Breakdown of Current Prize Money Structure
When the PDC, darts’ governing body, announced a bigger field for this year’s World Championship, they also revealed record prize money.
A staggering £5m will be up for grabs at Alexandra Palace with the winner walking off with a cheque for £1m on Saturday, January 3rd.
The runner-up will earn £400,000, semi-finalists £200,000 each while the four losing quarter-finalists will take home £100,000.
There is big money to be made losing in earlier rounds as well with £60,000 going to the fourth-round losers, £35,000 to players beaten in round three, £25,000 in round two and £15,000 in round one.
On top of that, any nine-darter thrown will be rewarded by a tournament sponsor who will give £60,000 to the player, another £60,000 to charity and another £60,000 to a random fan in the crowd.
| Stage | Prize Money |
|---|---|
| Winner | £1,000,000 |
| Runner-up | £400,000 |
| Semi-finalists | £200,000 |
| Quarter-finalists | £100,000 |
| Fourth Round losers | £60,000 |
| Third Round losers | £35,000 |
| Second Round losers | £25,000 |
| First Round losers | £15,000 |
| Total prize fund | £5,000,000 |
| Bonus – nine-dart finish | £60,000 |
Comparison Over Time
The prize money on offer this winter is a far cry from what the pioneers played for at the first World Darts Championship in 1978, when the winner, the great Leighton Rees, pocketed £3,500 for his feat, part of a prize purpose of just £10,000.
The first £100,000 winner’s cheque was handed to Phil ‘The Power’ Taylor in 2006 and now the man – or woman – who lifts the Sid Waddell Trophy on January 3 will be rewarded with £1m for the first time.
The rise and rise in prize money merely reflects the growth of the sport with sponsors tripping over themselves to get aligned with a tournament in which last year’s final between Luke Littler and Luke Humphries on Sky TV drew a record-breaking audience of 4.8 million.
Financial Impact on Players
For the big stars of darts, players like Littler, Humphries, Michael van Gerwen and Gerwyn Price, huge winners’ cheques come with the territory.
For players lower down the rankings, however, they can be life-changing. When Rob Cross was crowned world champion on his debut, the £400,000 first prize was more than he had won in his entire career up to that point.
Big prizes, however, come with plenty of jeopardy when it comes to the darts’ Order of Merit, the PDC’s ranking system which determines what events players can enter in the coming months.
The system is a two-year rolling system which means players who did well in the 2024 tournament have plenty of points to protect this time round.
Global Context
Darts players earn good money now, and while clearly not in the big league of tennis, golf or F1, prize money is massively on the rise.
Darts has always been seen as a sporting bedfellow of snooker, in which last year’s world champion, China’s Zhao Xintong, took home a cool £500,000 at The Crucible as part of a purse of just under £3m.
And darts is only going to get bigger with the PDC announcing a new five-year deal with Alexandra Palace which will see the tournament capacity at the venue almost double to 180,000 fans.
It’s a special event, made by the fans as much as the players in a real celebration of the best of sporting entertainment. And its future is brighter than ever.
SHOP LUKE LITTLER ‘EDGE’ DARTS HERE WITH FREE DELIVERY
