What is the Ultra Darts League?
Team darts barely exists below the professional game. The ADC Global Championship, the circuit’s own flagship, is a singles knockout, and the PDC’s team event lasts one weekend a year. The UDL borrows its shape from football instead: named city sides, two divisions, regional derbies and a finals weekend at the end of it.
Each side carries five players. Twenty teams therefore means 100 places, all of them filled by amateurs who have come up through ADC regional rankings rather than by invitation. Scott Hunt, the UDL’s founder and the ADC’s global operations director, told Darts World the league is “the future of team darts” and that the long-term ambition is to take it into Premier League stadiums.
Three-time world champion Michael van Gerwen has been named a UDL ambassador, and Winmau has signed a multi-year partnership covering the new league and the wider circuit.
Which 20 cities have teams?
The split is geographic rather than competitive — Scotland, the North East, the North West and Yorkshire anchor the North division, with Dublin and Belfast added to make ten. Wales, the Midlands, the East, London and the South East, and the South West make up the South.
| Division | Region | Teams |
|---|---|---|
| North | Scotland | Glasgow Shock, Aberdeen Force |
| North | North East | Newcastle Reign, Middlesbrough Power |
| North | North West | Manchester Mayhem, Carlisle Edge |
| North | Yorkshire & Humber | Leeds Empire, Sheffield Rush |
| North | Ireland | Dublin Fury |
| North | Northern Ireland | Belfast Might |
| South | Wales | Cardiff Blaze, Wrexham Surge |
| South | Midlands | Birmingham Forge, Stoke Terriers |
| South | East of England | Norwich Royals, Colchester Legion |
| South | South East & London | Portsmouth Armada, London Dynasty |
| South | South West | Exeter Storm, Bristol Sonic |
The map follows the ADC’s own regional structure rather than the professional circuit’s venue list, which is why Carlisle, Colchester, Stoke and Wrexham sit alongside Manchester, Birmingham and London. Dublin and Belfast are in the North division despite the geography, giving Ireland and Northern Ireland a team apiece.
How does a UDL match work?
Five boards, five matches thrown simultaneously, each a best of nine legs. Neither a match nor a fixture can finish level: a best of nine has a winner, and five matches settle at 3-2 or better. A season runs to four game weekends and then a Finals Weekend, and the ADC says regional derbies will be played three or four times across the season, with at least one of them staged at the MODUS Live Lounge in Portsmouth, where North meets South.
| Detail | Confirmed |
|---|---|
| Season One begins | March 2027 |
| Teams | 20, in two divisions of ten |
| Players per team | 5 (100 in total) |
| Match length | Best of 9 legs, never a draw |
| Boards in play | 5, with all five matches thrown at once |
| Season shape | 4 game weekends plus a Finals Weekend |
| Minimum age | 16 |
| Prize fund | £70,000 |
Featured fixtures stream on Pluto TV and on ADC LIVE. That is the same free-to-air route the circuit already uses for its Global Championship, and it means the UDL arrives without the subscription paywall that sits in front of most televised darts.
How do you get into a UDL team?
No trials, no selection meetings. Each Great Britain region is allocated ten places and all ten are earned on ranking evidence: the regional title winner takes one, the top six of that region’s ADC VAULT standings take six more provided they have played at least five events, and the top three of the ADC Open Rankings take the last three. Ireland and Northern Ireland are allocated five places each on the same one-six-three principle, scaled down.
Ten places in each Great Britain region; Ireland and Northern Ireland receive five each. Source: official UDL site, udl.dartscircuit.com
The entry cost is deliberately low. ADC membership runs to £5 a year, after the circuit cut its membership fees in August 2026 to lower the entry barrier to competitive play. The professional route asks rather more: Q-School entry costs £475 before a player has thrown a dart.
What do players get paid?
£100 for every weekend a player competes, plus a share of the £70,000 prize fund. The UDL site totals the season’s commitment at £154,000, money it describes as going into team darts for the players. Spread across 100 players that is modest money, but amateur darts has historically paid nothing at all for turning up, and an appearance fee for league darts below the professional tier is genuinely new.
UDL 1217: the 12-to-17 version
Running alongside the senior league is UDL 1217, a youth competition using the same twenty city teams with their own squads, their own weekends and their own Finals. Places come from the ADC VAULT rankings rather than trials, registration is by a parent or guardian, and the ADC has published safeguarding commitments — an officer at every venue and DBS-checked staff.
That matters more than it might sound. The PDC’s youth pathway runs through the Development Tour, which demands travel and entry fees from players who are still at school. A city team playing four weekends a year is a cheaper first rung.
What has not been announced yet
Fixtures, venues beyond the MODUS Live Lounge, squad lists and the exact dates of the finals weekends are all still to come; the ADC says they will be published alongside player registration. Nor has the league said how teams will be captained or coached, or whether the twenty cities are fixed or the first wave of a larger map — Hunt’s stated ambition points to the latter.
Season One does not throw until March, so the UDL will spend the winter in the shadow of the professional calendar. You can see what it is competing with on the 2027 darts calendar, and how the top of the professional game is shaped in the Premier League format explainer— the stadium circuit Hunt says he eventually wants a slice of.