PDC Order of Merit

The Professional Darts Corporation adopted the current Order of Merit system in 2007. In this system, the total prize money won in PDC ranking events over the eligibility period is counted. For PDC Tour Card holders, this eligibility period is either the previous two years or since the player was awarded a tour card, whichever is shorter.^[4] The PDC World Darts Championship is considered last event of the season, after which the year-end Order of Merit is calculated and players in the top 64 offered a Tour Card for the following year.^[4] New Tour Card holders start on £0, even if they held a Tour Card in the previous season but failed to make the top 64, resulting in them having to regain their Tour Card through the qualifying tournament, Q School.^[4] Players without Tour Cards who earn money in ranking tournaments (such as Luke Littler in the 2024 PDC World Darts Championship) are eligible to be ranked during the season,^[7] though if they fail to reach the top 64 at the end of the year, their ranking money is reset to £0.^[4] If two players are tied and need separating for seeding or event qualification, the tie is broken by player with the highest total earnings across the previous four ranking tournaments. If this fails to break the tie, players' prize money is counted back from the most recent event until a tie can be broken, with the possibility of a play-off if this cannot break the tie.^[4]

In addition to the main two-year Order of Merit, the PDC also operates three Orders of Merit for subsets of the PDC Tour and four Orders of Merit for secondary tours. These rankings offer qualification to televised events and are the basis for seeding in tournaments. Additionally, some secondary tours offer Tour Cards. These are secondary Orders of Merit are the:

• Pro Tour Order of Merit, which counts money earned in Players Championships and European Tour events over a 12-month rolling period. In addition to qualification for televised tournaments, this ranking determines the seedings for Players Championship events.^[13]
• European Tour Order of Merit, which counts money earned in European Tour events during the calendar year. The top 32 on this ranking list qualify for the European Championship at the end of the year, where all players are seeded according to their European Tour ranking.^[14]
• Players Championship Order of Merit, which counts money earned in Player Championship events during the calendar year. The top 64 on this ranking qualify for the Players Championship Finals. Similarly to the European Championship, all players are seeded according to their rank.^[15]
• World Series Order of Merit, which counts points earned in a calendar year in the world series. The top 8 on this ranking are seeded for the World Series of Darts Finals.
• Challenge Tour Order of Merit, which counts money earned in a calendar year on the Challenge Tour, a secondary tour open to players without Tour Cards that participated in the most recent Q-School. Top ranked players at the end of the year may qualify for televised tournaments and receive Tour Cards, depending on their rank.^[16] The Challenge Tour Order of Merit also acts as a reserve list for Pro Tour events.^[4]
• Development Tour Order of Merit, which counts money earned in a calendar year on the Development Tour, a secondary open to some Tour Card holders and players without Tour Card aged 16–23. Top ranked players at the end of the year may qualify for televised tournaments and receive Tour Cards, depending on their rank.^[17]
• Women's Series Order of Merit, which counts money earned in a calendar year on the Women's Series, a secondary tour for female players.^[4] Top ranked players at the end of the year may qualify for televised tournaments and receive Tour Cards, depending on their rank.^[18]
• Women's World Matchplay Order of Merit, which counts money earned on the Women's Series earned over an approximately 12-month period prior to the Women's World Matchplay, to the which the top 8 players are invited.^[4]

Prior to 2007, a ranking point system was used where ranking points were awarded according to the stage reached in a tournament and the relative prestige of the tournament.^[21] There was no limit on the number of tournaments which counted to the tally, which meant that the top-ranked players were not necessarily the best-performing in the major tournaments. For instance, Colin Lloyd was the world number one player in the PDC for most of 2005 and 2006, despite most of the major titles being shared between Phil Taylor, Raymond van Barneveld and John Part.^[22]

PDC Ranking Leaders Timeline^[5][23]

14 players have held the position of World Number One since the World Darts Council started new rankings in 1993. Seven different players held the position in the old points system, and eight players have held the position since the PDC switched to the two-year earnings based Order of Merit system in 2007, with Phil Taylor being the only player to have been number one in both eras.

Notable players not to be ranked world number one in the PDC include: Two-time back-to-back PDC World Champions Adrian Lewis and Gary Anderson, 11-time major title winner James Wade and 2018 world champion Rob Cross.^[24]

More information Player, # ...

Player	#	Years in which player stood Number 1
Phil Taylor	13	1996 2000 2002 2003 2004 2006 2007 2008 2009 2010 2011 2012 2013
Michael van Gerwen	7	2014 2015 2016 2017 2018 2019 2020
Alan Warriner	6	1993 1994 1997 1998 2001 2002
Rod Harrington	5	1995 1996 1998 1999 2000
Colin Lloyd	3	2005 2006 2007
Dennis Priestley	2	1994 1995
Peter Manley	2	2000 2001
Gerwyn Price	2	2021 2022
Luke Humphries	2	2024 2025
Luke Littler	2	2025 2026
Raymond van Barneveld	1	2008
John Part	1	2003
Peter Wright	1	2022
Michael Smith	1	2023
Italic indicates the player was reigning world champion that year Bold indicates the player stood number one at the conclusion of that year's world championship

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Periods

More information No., Player(s) ...

No.	Player(s)	From		Length	Ref.
1	Alan Warriner-Little	January 1993	Incarnation of the WDC	674 days[A]	[5]
2	Dennis Priestley	6 November 1994	1994 Lada UK Masters	155 days	[5][25]
3	Rod Harrington	10 April 1995	1995 UK Matchplay	479 days[A]	[5][25]
4	Phil Taylor	August 1996		31 days[A]	[5][25]
	Alan Warriner-Little (2)	September 1996		699 days[A]	[5][25]
	Rod Harrington (2)	1 August 1998	1998 World Matchplay	728 days	[5][25]
	Phil Taylor (2)	29 July 2000	2000 World Matchplay	57 days	[5][25]
5	Peter Manley	24 September 2000	2000 Windy City Open	399 days	[5][25]
	Alan Warriner-Little (3)	28 October 2001	2001 World Grand Prix	69 days	[5][25]
	Alan Warriner-Little (4) and Phil Taylor (3)	5 January 2002	2002 World Championship	28 days	[5][25]
	Alan Warriner-Little (5)	2 February 2002	2002 Eastbourne Open	88 days[A]	[5][25]
	Phil Taylor (4)	May 2002		248 days[A]	[5][25]
6	John Part	4 January 2003	2003 World Championship	203 days	[5][25]
	Phil Taylor (5)	26 July 2003	2003 Bobby Bourn Memorial Trophy	582 days	[5][25]
7	Colin Lloyd	27 February 2005	2005 West Tyrone Open	469 days	[26][25]
	Phil Taylor (6)	11 June 2006	2006 UK Open	7 days	[27][28]
	Colin Lloyd (2)	18 June 2006	2006 Players Championship 3	197 days	[28][25]
	Phil Taylor (7)	1 January 2007	2007 World Championship	365 days	[5][25]
8	Raymond van Barneveld	1 January 2008	2008 World Championship	159 days	[29][25]
	Phil Taylor (8)	8 June 2008	2008 UK Open	2,033 days	[29][30]
9	Michael van Gerwen	1 January 2014	2014 World Championship	2,559 days	[30][31]
10	Gerwyn Price	3 January 2021	2021 World Championship	427 days	[31][32]
11	Peter Wright	6 March 2022	2022 UK Open	140 days	[32][33]
	Gerwyn Price (2)	24 July 2022	2022 World Matchplay	77 days	[33]
	Peter Wright (2)	9 October 2022	2022 World Grand Prix	21 days	[34]
	Gerwyn Price (3)	30 October 2022	2022 European Championship	65 days	[34][35]
12	Michael Smith	3 January 2023	2023 World Championship	365 days	[35]
13	Luke Humphries	3 January 2024	2024 World Championship	683 days	[36][37]
14	Luke Littler	16 November 2025	2025 Grand Slam	120 days	[6]

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1. [A]

   Uses 1st of month where exact date unknown.

Key

Before January 2007	Used old points system
Current	Reigning number one on Order of Merit

Following the World Darts Council split from the British Darts Organisation between 1992 and 1994, the WDC drew up its first ranking list in the run-up to its inaugural 1994 World Championship. Mike Gregory and Chris Johns later went back to the BDO set up, and Bobby George and many of the non-UK players never competed in the early days of the WDC.^{[citation needed]}

More information Ranking, Player ...

Ranking	Player		Ranking	Player
1	Alan Warriner		16	Jann Hoffmann
2	Rod Harrington		=	Chris Johns
3	Phil Taylor		=	Roland Scholten
4	John Lowe		19	Raymond van Barneveld
5	Mike Gregory		=	Keith Deller
6	Peter Evison		21	Bobby George
7	Kevin Spiolek		22	Per Skau
=	Dennis Priestley		23	Bernd Hebecker
9	Bob Anderson		=	Andree Welge
10	Jocky Wilson		=	Pascal Rabau
11	Jamie Harvey		26	Leo Laurens
12	Eric Bristow		=	Bert Vlaardingerbroek
13	Cliff Lazarenko		=	Tom Kirby
14	Magnus Caris		=	Wayne Weening
=	Steve Beaton		=	Mauro Levy

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