At Arena MK in Milton Keynes, the Winmau World Masters 2026 takes place between Wednesday 28 January - Sunday February 1. For this first major of the new season, the top 24 of the PDC Order of Merit are seeded directly. In addition, eight more places are available via the qualifier.
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Since last year, the Winmau World Masters has been a ranking event. The tournament was won last year by Luke Humphries, who edged Jonny Clayton 6-5 in the final. Notable fact: this is one of the few majors Luke Littler has never won. Alongside the top 24 in the world rankings, more than a hundred players battled on Wednesday, January 28, for a place in the main draw of this major with Jimmy van Schie, Wessel Nijman and Shane McGuirk among the eight winning through.
Peter Wright, Michael Smith, Beau Greaves and Joe Cullen all are among those who did not win through and lost early in Milton Keynes before the first round.
The main event will be broadcast live from Thursday. You can also watch the qualifier live on Wednesday, January 28. For this you need an account on PDC TV. For now, they have announced that one match per session will be streamed live from a single board. Should more boards become available live, we will report it here.
How to watch World Masters in UK, USA and Australia with new team on ITV
For UK darts fans, the tournament can once again be followed via ITV4. Sessions start at 7:00 PM on both Thursday and Friday and wrap up around 11:00pm. The weekend schedule has been confirmed with ITV4 and ITVX (their streaming platform) showing it in full with their new team led by Pete Graves with Wayne Mardle also involved as a pundit for the first time. Sometimes EFL (English Football League) highlights see the tournaments relegated to ITV3 on the Saturday evening but that is not the case this time around.
Wayne Mardle is set for his ITV debut this weekend.
Albeit in terms of the team who else will be involved isn't set albeit Chris Mason, Dan Dawson and Mark Wilson who are all part of the new team were all in Milton Keynes commentating on the qualifiers. Ian Danter, Glen Durrant and Mark Webster have also been confirmed overall as well as Gabriella Partington who it seems will tackle the World Series events with Graves who works for Sky Sports at least for the time being on the majors.
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There will be afternoon sessions on both Saturday and Sunday with the first round spanning two days between Thursday and Friday 29th and 30th while the remainder of the event which is Last 16 to the final will take place between Saturday and Sunday with the Quarter-Finals, Semi-Finals and Final all on the Sunday afternoon and evening.
In the US and Australia, it will be PDCTV that will show the event but this is always subject to change with Peacock in the States and the likes of Stan Sport in Australia having rights to show select tournaments. So every territory is subject to change.
Kieran Wood is a sports journalist based in Wales and has been active in journalism since 2022. He contributes to DartsNews.com, where he covers professional darts through news, match reports, analysis, and live coverage across the PDC calendar and major tournaments.
A key part of his work is on-site reporting from leading events. Kieran has covered the PDC World Darts Championship in person, reporting daily from the venue and providing first-hand insight from the tournament. During his coverage, he has conducted interviews with leading players including Luke Littler, Luke Humphries, and Gerwyn Price.
He is also one of the leading voices of the English-language Dartsnews Podcast, contributing regular analysis and discussion on developments across the professional darts circuit.
In his reporting, Kieran places strong emphasis on careful sourcing, editorial accuracy, and updating articles when new, verified information becomes available.
ONE WEEK TO GO! 🤩
The 2026 Winmau World Masters gets underway this time next week. So let's look back at last year's winning moment in Milton Keynes. 👇