Best Dartboards: Sisal, Staple-Free and Electronic Compared
Buy a sisal bristle board with staple-free wiring. Hang it with the centre of the bullseye 68 inches from the finished floor and set the throw line 93.25 inches away for steel tip or 96 inches for soft tip. The lane needs about 9 ft 9 in by 5 ft, which fits along the long wall of most spare bedrooms.
Darts is the highest value per square foot in this hobby by an enormous margin. A hundred dollar board on a wall gets played on a Tuesday evening in a way that a three thousand dollar table in a room you have to go downstairs for does not. The whole installation is two anchors and a strip of tape, and the two numbers that matter are fixed: bull at 68 inches, throw line at 93.25 inches.
Hang it to the numbers rather than by eye. The dartboard layout calculator gives you the bull height, the throw line and the diagonal check figure for your tip type, and how to hang a dartboard covers the anchors and the common errors.
Dartboards at three budgets
Accudart Classic 18in Sisal Dartboard
A genuine 18 in sisal board at under thirty dollars, which is the price at which a dartboard stops being a toy. Sisal is the whole thing: the fibres part when a dart lands and close again when it is pulled, which is why a sisal board self-heals and a paper-wound one does not.
- Material
- Sisal
- Size
- 18 in
Best for: A first board, or a second board for a garage.
Franklin Sports 18in Bristle Dartboard
A standard 18 in bristle board with a rotating number ring, so you can move the wear around the board rather than destroying the twenty bed. That single feature roughly doubles the useful life of a board in regular use.
- Material
- Bristle sisal
- Ring
- Rotating
Best for: A household that will throw several nights a week without being precious about it.
Franklin Grade A Staple-Free Dartboard
Staple-free construction, which is the specification worth paying for. The wires at the trebles are thinner and mounted without staples at the intersections, so darts that would bounce out of a cheaper board stick. The difference is obvious within one evening of play.
- Material
- Grade A sisal
- Wires
- Staple free
Best for: The default board for anyone who plays properly.
Accudart Match Pro Dartboard Cabinet Set
Cabinet, board, two sets of darts and a scoreboard together. In a room that is not only a game room, the cabinet is the feature: doors that close turn a dartboard into a piece of wall furniture and catch a fraction of the stray darts on the way.
- Includes
- Board, cabinet, darts
- Board
- Bristle
Best for: A spare room, a living room wall, or anywhere the board has to disappear sometimes.
Viper 850 Electronic Soft Tip Dartboard
An electronic board that scores for you and supports soft tip play, which matters in a household with children or a rented room where a stray steel tip is a real problem. Understand that it is a different game: the throw line is longer and the practice does not transfer cleanly to a bristle board.
- Type
- Electronic
- Tips
- Soft
Best for: Families, rentals, and anyone who hates keeping score.
Arachnid CricketMaxx 1.0 Electronic Dartboard
A wide target area and a large number of games, at the price where electronic boards start being reliable rather than frustrating. Segment sensitivity is what separates a good electronic board from an annoying one, and this is on the right side of that line.
- Type
- Electronic
- Tips
- Soft
Best for: A family room where automatic scoring is the point.
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The numbers, once, correctly
| Measurement | Steel tip | Soft tip |
|---|---|---|
| Floor to centre of bull | 68" (5 ft 8 in) | 68" (5 ft 8 in) |
| Throw line, horizontal | 93.25" (7 ft 9.25 in) | 96" (8 ft) |
| Diagonal, bull to oche | 115.5" (9 ft 7.375 in) | 117.64" |
| Minimum lane length | 9 ft 9 in | 10 ft |
| Minimum lane width | 5 ft | 5 ft |
Measure the bull height to the finished floor. If flooring is going down after the board goes up, the board will end up low by the thickness of the floor. It is a small error that teaches muscle memory which does not transfer to any other board in the world, and it is the most common mistake in a home setup.
What actually separates dartboards
- Sisal, not paper. Sisal fibres part when a dart lands and close when it is pulled, so the board self-heals. Paper-wound and cork boards accumulate visible holes and soften, and darts start dropping out within months. Any board sold as bristle should be sisal.
- Staple-free wiring. On a traditional board the wire spider is held at its intersections with small staples, and a dart landing on one bounces out. Staple-free boards remove them and use a thinner wire at the trebles. This is the specification worth paying for.
- A rotating number ring. Roughly half of all darts land in and around the twenty bed. A ring that unclips and rotates lets you move the wear, which roughly doubles the useful life of the board.
- Wire profile. Thinner and more triangular in section means a dart is more likely to deflect into a segment than back out at you. This is where the money goes on premium boards.
- Size, which is not a variable. A regulation board is 17.75 inches in outside diameter. Anything sold as an 18 in board is correct; anything smaller is a toy regardless of what else it claims.
Steel tip against electronic
Electronic boards score for you and take soft tips, which are two genuine advantages, and they are the right answer in specific households: young children, a rented room, a wall you cannot put holes near. The Viper 850 and the Arachnid CricketMaxx are the two worth looking at, and soft tip darts come in packs of nine because they get lost.
What they are not is a better version of the same game. Soft tip throws from 96 inches rather than 93.25, the plastic tips behave differently in flight, and the segment geometry on an electronic board is not identical to a bristle board. Practice on one does not transfer cleanly to the other. If the goal is to play the game a league plays, buy sisal. The full argument is in bristle against electronic, and the electronic options are covered in the electronic dartboard roundup.
What to buy alongside the board
- A throw line. The cheapest and most important thing here. A peel-and-stick oche at twelve dollars, a Winmau adhesive line at nine, or a laser line at twenty two for a finished room where tape looks wrong.
- A surround or backboard. A foam surround or a Wall Defender catches the darts that miss, which on painted drywall pays for itself once. See the surround roundup.
- Tungsten darts. The brass darts in a cabinet set are fatter than a tungsten dart of the same weight, so three of them will not fit in a treble bed that would take three slim ones. Red Dragon Pegasus at twenty four grams is the cheapest genuinely good set. See the dart roundup.
- Light on the board, not behind you. A ring light around the board removes your own shadow from the target, which a ceiling light behind you creates.
- A scoreboard. A dry erase board for thirty dollars. Scoring on a phone kills the game stone dead.
Keeping a board alive
Rotate the number ring every few weeks. Never soak a sisal board, which appears as advice in odd corners of the internet and destroys it. Keep the room between 45 and 50 percent relative humidity, because sisal swells in damp and stops closing over dart holes, which is the usual reason a board in a basement dies early. And pull darts with a slight twist rather than straight out, which is easier on the fibres. Done consistently, that turns a two year board into a six year one.
For the cabinet that hides all of it, see the cabinet roundup, and for a complete room built around darts see the starter buildout.
Frequently asked questions
What height should a dartboard be?
The centre of the bullseye sits 68 inches from the finished floor, which is 5 ft 8 in, and it is identical for steel tip and soft tip. Measure to the finished floor, meaning on top of whatever flooring will actually be there, not to a bare subfloor. Getting this wrong by an inch is the most common mistake in a home setup, and it teaches muscle memory that does not transfer to any other board.
How far should you stand from a dartboard?
93.25 inches for steel tip, which is 7 ft 9.25 in, and 96 inches for soft tip and electronic boards, which is 8 ft exactly. That is measured horizontally from the face of the board to the back edge of the throw line. Check the work with the diagonal from the bull to the back of the oche: it should read 9 ft 7.375 in for steel tip, which catches an out-of-plumb wall or an uneven floor.
What is the best material for a dartboard?
Sisal, which is a natural fibre also called bristle. The fibres part when a dart lands and close again when it is pulled, so a sisal board effectively self-heals and lasts for years of regular play. Paper-wound and cork boards are the alternative and they do not self-heal: they accumulate visible holes, the segments soften, and darts start dropping out. Any board sold as a bristle board should be sisal, and the price difference is small enough that there is no reason to buy anything else.
What does staple-free mean on a dartboard?
On a traditional board the wire spider that divides the segments is held at its intersections by small staples, and a dart that lands on a staple bounces out. Staple-free boards mount the wires without them and use a thinner wire profile at the trebles, so darts that would have bounced instead stick. It is the one specification worth paying up for and the difference is obvious within an evening.
How much room does a dartboard need?
A lane of about 9 ft 9 in long by 5 ft wide, which is the throw distance plus two feet of standing room behind the oche and thirty inches of clearance each side of the board centre. That fits along the long wall of most spare bedrooms, which is why darts is the highest value per square foot in the whole hobby. It also wants about 7 ft 6 in of ceiling.
How do I make a dartboard last longer?
Rotate the number ring every few weeks so the wear moves off the twenty bed, which is where perhaps half of all darts land. Never soak a sisal board, which people occasionally read as advice and which destroys it. Keep the room between 45 and 50 percent relative humidity, because sisal swells in damp and stops closing over dart holes. And remove darts by twisting slightly rather than pulling straight, which is easier on the fibres.
Measuring your own room before anything is delivered? The Game Room Layout Planner is the paid version of these pages: 8 printable worksheets you fill in with your own numbers, plus the full PDF, $29.
How we work: we compare published manufacturer dimensions, the governing playing standards for each game, and reviews from owners who live with the equipment. We do not test games in person, and we say so on every page. Clearance figures here are researched guidance for planning a room, not professional advice: measure your own space, and have a slate table delivered, assembled and levelled by an installer rather than moving it yourself.