Best dartboards under $100

This is the headline of the band: the standard Blade 6 is from Winmau's premium range and it fits under $100. That is unusual, and it is the reason a hundred dollars is a genuinely good dartboard budget rather than a compromise one.

What the Blade range is sold on is wire profile - thin, low-profile wiring that reduces bounce-outs and deflections at the trebles and doubles. That is the specification that matters most on any board, because a dart that strikes wire is lost for reasons that have nothing to do with the throw. The treble twenty is ringed with wire on four sides, so wire profile converts directly into scores.

Winmau is a Welsh manufacturer founded in 1945 and the title sponsor of the Winmau World Masters, the oldest darts tournament still running, and the boards are made in Kenya, where the sisal comes from. For a board in this band that supply chain is worth something: it is why the density and the finish are consistent between units.

Unicorn is the main alternative to Winmau at this level, and the Eclipse HD2 Pro approaches the wire problem with its own geometry rather than a cheaper version of someone else's. Players who have thrown on both usually have a preference, and it is genuinely a preference rather than a ranking.

The sisal is the same category of material - tightly bound agave fibre that parts around the dart and closes again - and the construction is professional-level, with the bullseye fixed without staples. In other words, nothing structural is given up by choosing this over the Blade.

The specific reason to buy it is household coherence. If the darts, flights and shafts in the house are Unicorn, matching the board simplifies spares, and there is no technical penalty. Winmau vs Unicorn is the full comparison.

Scoring is the hidden barrier in darts. A standard game requires subtracting three-dart totals from 501 and then finishing on a double, and that stops a lot of casual households dead - not because it is hard but because it is work. An electronic board does it for you, which is why electronic boards get played on in houses where a bristle board would not.

The Viper 800 is the better-specified of the two electronic boards here: more stored game variants, a larger display and a segment layout designed to reduce bounce-outs, which on an electronic board means darts not seating in the holes rather than hitting wire.

The trade is that electronic boards use soft-tip darts, which is a related but distinct discipline - soft-tip has its own governing body in the World Soft Darts Association, and its own tournament circuit. Steel-tip darts will destroy an electronic board. Steel tip vs soft tip covers what you are choosing between.

If the appeal of an electronic board is purely that it keeps score, this is the cheaper way to get that. The Viper 777 does the same core job as the 800 above - automatic scoring, soft-tip segments, a display - with a shorter list of stored games and a simpler cabinet.

In practice most households play one or two games. The long game lists on electronic boards are a specification-sheet feature rather than something families exhaust, so paying less for fewer of them is usually the right call. What is worth checking is the number of players supported, since that is the one that does get used.

Same caveats as any electronic board apply: soft tip only, plastic segments that wear, and electronics as the likeliest failure point. In exchange, nobody has to subtract 57 from 243 while standing up.

Nodor acquired Winmau in 2002 and both brands remain in production, so this is not an off-brand board - it is the same company's value line. The Supabull II is real sisal, which means it self-heals, which is the specification that separates a dartboard from a target.

Spending around half the Blade price here is often the smarter total-setup decision. The things that make a dart corner enjoyable are the board, a surround, a light and a correctly placed oche, and a cheaper board that leaves budget for the other three produces a better corner than a premium board alone in a dark alcove.

What you give up is wire profile and core density: more bounce-outs than a Blade board and a shorter service life. For a garage board or a second location that is the right trade. Best dartboards for garage covers the damp issues that matter more there than the board does.

This is the budget pick and the test it has to pass is simple: is it real bristle? It is. The Shot King is sisal, so it self-heals, and that puts it in a different category from the cork and coiled-paper boards sold at similar money, which are punctured permanently by every dart.

Viper is a games-room brand rather than a darts specialist, and the board is specified accordingly: real but less dense sisal, standard round wire rather than a thin blade profile. Expect more bounce-outs and a shorter life than anything above it here.

For a first board that is entirely reasonable. It is the cheapest honest way to find out whether a household will throw darts, and the money left over covers a surround and a light - which, for a beginner, improve the experience more than a better board would. Dartboard buying guide covers the whole setup.