501 Darts Rules

A dartboard has twenty numbered segments plus a bull in the middle. The thin outer ring doubles the segment, the thin middle ring trebles it, and the two larger areas are worth the plain number.

The maximum visit is 180, three treble 20s. That is why 20 sits at the top of the board and why almost all scoring is aimed there.

• •Both players start on 501.
• •Players alternate visits. A visit is three darts, thrown one at a time.
• •The visit total is subtracted from the score. Throw 60, 60 and 20 and you take 140 off.
• •A dart that misses the board, bounces out or falls out scores nothing and cannot be re-thrown.
• •Play continues until one player reaches exactly zero on a double.

Darts must be thrown from behind the oche, the throwing line, which sits 2.37 m (7 ft 9¼ in) from the face of the board. The bull is 1.73 m (5 ft 8 in) from the floor. Full board and oche measurements.

This is the rule that makes 501 a game rather than an arithmetic race. Scoring 501 points is straightforward; landing on a number you can finish from, and then hitting a thin 8 mm ring, is not.

It also means the last part of a leg is played backwards. Rather than scoring as much as possible, you are steering your score towards a specific number — ideally an even one, so a missed double still leaves a double.

Double out and busting in detail, or jump to the full checkout chart.

Three things bust a visit, and all three have the same consequence.

• •Scoring more than you need. On 32, a treble 20 takes you to −28. Bust.
• •Leaving exactly 1. The lowest double is 2, so 1 cannot be finished. On 32, a single 11 leaves 21, then a single 20 leaves 1. Bust.
• •Reaching zero without a double. On 32, a single 16 leaves 16, then a single 16 reaches zero on a single. Bust.

When you bust, your score reverts to what it was at the start of the visit and any darts left in your hand are forfeited. Busting on the first dart costs you three darts; busting on the third costs you one. The score is the same either way, but the darts you lose are not, which is why decent scorers record which dart the bust happened on.

Here is a 15-dart leg, which is professional standard, to show how the arithmetic runs.

That is a nine-darter, the perfect leg. A more typical strong leg looks like 140, 100, 100, 81, 80 — five visits, 15 darts, and a three-dart average of 100.2.

The finish above is 141, which routes as T20T19D12 — treble 20 leaves 81, treble 19 leaves 24, double 12 wins.

A single game to zero is a leg. Matches are almost never a single leg, because throwing first is a real advantage — you get to the finish a visit earlier.

Formats fix this by alternating the throw. In a best-of-legs match the players take turns starting each leg. In a set format, a set is usually best of five legs and the match is best of a number of sets, with the throw alternating between legs and the first throw of each set alternating too.

The very first throw is decided by a bull-up: one dart each at the bull, closest starts. If the first player hits the inner bull the second may ask for the dart to be removed before throwing.

• •Straight out. Any segment finishes. Common in casual pub play and much quicker.
• •Double in. You must hit a double before any of your scoring counts. Standard in 301 and rare in 501.
• •Master out. A double or a treble finishes. Used in some American leagues.
• •701, 1001. Same rules, longer legs, usually played by teams.