No Need to Go to the Bar: The Best Dartboards

The Cricketview 2DX features a surface composed of a variation on the self-healing sisal fiber surface, meaning it can accommodate both soft and steel tip darts. This versatility makes the board safe for young players who may not be old enough to use steel tips while letting the more seasoned veteran players try their skill with something that resembles authentic pub-style play. The target area measures 13.5 inches in diameter so it's slightly smaller than some of the other picks on our list, and comes mounted in a wood cabinet with a pair of doors that open up to reveal two scoreboard displays. The Cricketview 2DX is loaded with 37 different games and 210 level variations for hours of unique and varied gameplay options, including a one-player option and if the name didn't clue you in, plenty of cricket variations. There’s even a heckler feature that will trash talk you if you’re playing poorly.

The Arachnid Inter-Active 6000 has been programmed with 27 different games, comes with a regulation 15.5 inch target surface, keeps score for you with a fully lit LED screen and it even tells you when to throw. You can accommodate up to eight players in a game and it comes with six darts and replacement tips. But perhaps the best part about the Arachnid Inter-Active 6000 is its heckling feature. That's right, the dart board will taunt you when you miss or score poorly. While this unique feature may potentially lessen the life of the board depending on your temper, you can always shut it off but where's the fun in that?

The Illuminator 3.0 does just what its names says it does. Illuminates various areas of the board for a different spin on the typical game of darts. The number ring is equipped with a set of LED's that glow all around the board. There are 86 games programmed into the Illuminator’s CPU of which 19 have a light-up version that uses the glowing light capabilities within the playing surface. These include “Light-Up Cricket” where you have to shoot out the lights between numbers 15-20, “Color Shot” where players have to shoot out color-coded light segments, “Light-Up Roundabout” where players hit targets successively around the board, and “Memory” which requires players to hit segments that flash in the order in which they flashed. The scoring surface is 13 1/2 inches wide and comes with many of the same features as our previous boards such as a one-player feature, a heckler setting, and a set of six darts so you can play the game right out of the box.

The Viper line of dart boards are known for their quality and affordability with the 787 exemplifying the best of both worlds. You get a ton of 241 game already programmed while the surface has been outfitted with concave segment holes and clearly delineated segments at which to aim. If you miss the target entirely, it's no big deal as the 787 has an outer catch ring to intercept those missed throws. There's a whole list of great features for playability including automatic cricket and game 01 buttons, missed dart and bounce out buttons, single and double bull options, and voice notifications on which player is up and remove dart prompts. The unit comes with six soft-tip darts so you're ready to play once the board is mounted.

The Rigel comes with 35 games, and 229 scoring options all of which are brightly displayed along the LED scoreboard at the bottom of the unit. The 13 inch surface makes it smaller for easier portability and suitability for any room or playing environment without out taking up much space while also providing the feel of tournament game play. Six soft tip darts are included in the set and they offer a little bit of friendly international rivalry with three flights that feature the American Stars and Stripes and the other three with England’s Union Jack. There's even an XO pattern ready-made for cricket games and this unit has plenty of those to choose from.The dart tips stay in the board with ease, and in case you snap or break one of them, Fat Cat includes another 30 replacement tips. For a price tag of around $50 from most major online retailers you're getting a whole lot of game play at a reasonable price.

Winmau's Blade IV dart board is comprised of premium quality sisal fibers tightly woven for the cleanest and best healing of any dart board on the list. The Blade IV is completely staple-free and incorporates some of the thinnest sector wire available on the market, this means less bounce-outs and higher scoring all around. It also comes with a removable number ring, which allows you to rotate the board for even distribution of wear and tear so you can extend the life of the playing surface. The Blade IV features a target area of 13.5 inches and comes with a darts booklet, a checkout table, and easy to apply mounting hardware.

Endorsed by the American Darts Organization, Nodor board boasts many of the same features as the Winmau Blade IV including premium East African sisal fibers compressed to minimize dart impact, thin section dividers, and a removable number ring. But unlike the Blade IV, the Supawire only contains a staple free bulls-eye while the rest of the board uses a small number of them for construction. But the selling point here is the namesake of the product; the Supawire dividers are extremely thin with rounded edges and really minimize the number of bounce-outs per game. I did find that the Winmau healed better than the Nodor, but the two of them are so very similar in nearly every other category of comparison. The Supawire is regulation size and takes very little time to mount correctly.

This board from Viper is well-suited to players who want to sharpen their skills for total control and precision. The League Pro has a regulation size surface diameter of 18 inchers and is made of tightly-woven, high-quality sisal fibers that heal quickly and completely after each dart is removed. The board can handle both steel and soft-tip darts so players of any age can have a go at the game, though steel tips would certainly prove more successful without any bounce outs.

All wires in and on the board have a rounded shape designed to prevent darts from bouncing out, making the game play easier and giving you more confidence with every thrown dart. The number ring on the outside of the board has a low-glare coating so it won't interfere with your line of sight and it's removable to extend the life of the product. This way you won't wear out the board unevenly in just certain areas of the surface since rotating the board allows for dart penetration to be more equally proportioned.

This sturdy dart board comes in at a whopping 24 pounds but it’s actually the cabinet is where much of that weight comes from, built of half inch thick North American Yellow Poplar Hardwood with a Cherry finish. So it's not just durable but attractive as well which should complement the look of any room. Just make sure you've got a good wall stud to mount this board with or you'll have it on the floor in no time. As for the board, it features a bristle surface with a staple-free bulls eye to reduce bounce-outs. This one also comes with a removable number ring so you'll even out the wear and tear on the board. The board also comes with six steel-tip darts that feature Union Jack and Old Glory flights for a little friendly cross-pond rivalry between players. This one's more of an investment than a purchase, ensuring you won't be buying another board for quite some time.

For those of you who've read through this list and still aren't sure if any of them are suitable for young children, then this one should do the trick. There are no sharp points to poke or injure tiny hands, yet this board still offers game play similar to a real set of darts. The board is a metal plate that’s been painted to look like an actual bristle board, complete with cracks in the segments to suggest a well-worn surface from years of use. But the real selling point here is the special darts that come with the set. They certainly look different than usual soft or steel tips, made with N-35 Neodymium rare earth magnets, offering some of the most powerful adherence capabilities you're going to find. The rest of the dart is made of DoinkIt's exclusive soft, flexible, lightweight material to ensure they fly fast and sure at the board or any other magnetic surface for that matter.