The 2026 World Darts Championship has a £1,000,000 prize fund available to the winner of the tournament.
Darts is bigger and more popular than it’s ever been and with more eyeballs, brings more money to the sport.
Players can now become multi-millionaires within a year of playing professionally.
If you rewind just a few decades though, a player wouldn’t crack a million in prize money earned over a 10-year period, never mind a single tournament!
**With the exception of a certain player that is 👀
In this article, we’re looking at the highest earning darts players from the 2000’s to see how much the best in the game were earning before the TRUE mega money came into darts…
SEE MORE RANKING LISTS ON DECENT DARTS
👉 8 best darts players from the 2000’s [ranked]
👉 10 highest earning darts players of all time [ranked]
Highest Earning Darts Players From The 2000’s
10) Roland Scholten – £426,505
It’s fair to say Roland Scholten could be thought of as a forgotten man in darts.
Having started on the BDO circuit in the 1990’s alongside fellow countryman Raymond van Barneveld, Scholten would make the semi-final of the 1996 Winmau World Masters and 1998 BDO World Championship before moving to the PDC in 2000.
It was during his time in the PDC that he had enjoyed the most success. A runner-up in the 2001 World Grand Prix, Scholten would go on to win the 2004 UK Open and finish runner-up in the 2006 Premier League.
These weren’t purple patches though… Throughout the early-mid 2000’s Scholten made it to the semi-finals or quarter-finals of PDC major tournaments on several occasions.
In 2008 he suffered neck and shoulder injuries that he couldn’t ever recover from so his career was quite short lived but in that time he still managed to make £426,505 in earnings and lift a PDC major title.
9) Adrian Lewis – £436,135
One of the most naturally gifted darts players of all time, Adrian Lewis had the most success in the 2010’s where he became a back-to-back world champion.
The foundation was built in the 2000’s though where the talented player would become the training partner to his mentor Phil Taylor who also resided in Stoke-on-Trent.
Lewis joined the PDC in 2004 and by 2006 he’d established himself as a top 8 player in the division.
While Lewis didn’t lift any titles in the 2000’s, he reached the final of the inaugural 2008 European Championship and had several quarter-final finishes in major ranking tournaments.
Despite only really playing the latter half of the decade, Lewis still made it onto this list (though his big paydays would come some years later).
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8) Wayne Mardle – £438,480
Mostly known to new darts fans as a darts commentator and presenter for Sky Sports, Hawaii 501 had a VERY solid career on the oche.
Very narrowly earning more than Adrian Lewis throughout the decade, Wayne Mardle makes it to number 8 on the list.
Mardle played professional darts from 2002-2011 and is a player whose name is in contention as one of the better players to never win a major title.
He was runner-up at the 2003 World Matchplay, 2004 Las Vegas Classic and 2005 Las Vegas Classic, losing on all three occasions to Phil Taylor.
Related – 7 darts players who could’ve had better careers if Phil Taylor never existed
Mardle was also a four-time semi-finalist at the PDC World Championship with his 2008 loss to Kirk Shepherd the most notable and surprising loss.
Despite no silverware, Mardle was able to earn a decent living at the time and something he continues to this day, albeit not in terms of prize money anymore.
7) Peter Manley – £462,395
Similar to Mardle, Peter Manley could have been more successful if Phil Taylor wasn’t around during the same era.
Manley was a three-time PDC World Championship runner-up with all three losses coming at the hands of Phil Taylor.
With his appearances in 1999, 2002 and 2006 they were spaced out enough to show he wasn’t having a good run of form but was actually one of the best players during that decade.
He was able to win the 2004 Las Vegas Classic but the 2000’s were a similar story to those already mentioned with several semi-final finishes.
It’s not too surprising then that Manley had similar earnings over that time frame.
6) Terry Jenkins – £544,845
Terry Jenkins is widely considered to be the best player to never win a PDC major title. This isn’t just based on opinion though, he has stats that back it up.
Jenkins made it to NINE PDC major finals, only to finish runner-up on all occasions.
It’s still a huge achievement considering these losses were against the likes of Phil Taylor, James Wade, Adrian Lewis, Raymond van Barneveld and Michael van Gerwen!
Jenkins was a professional player from 2003-2018 with his best performances coming in the latter half of the 2000’s. 2007 in particular was a peak year for The Bull as he made it to a minimum quarter-final stage in every tournament.
He was also a four-time runner-up that year in the World Matchplay, World Grand Prix, Premier League and Las Vegas Classic.
Even without a big payday, Jenkins was able to pass the halfway mark to a million throughout the duration of the decade.
5) Colin Lloyd – £559,905
Another player you think of straight away for darts in the 2000’s is Colin Lloyd. Firstly because of this viral headloss moment… 👇
But also because he was a top player during that era.
Jaws won the 2004 World Grand Prix, 2005 World Matchplay and was also a runner-up in a few other PDC major tournaments.
Again, like many others on this list he was a regular when it came to the deeper stages in major tournaments with dozens of quarter-final and semi-final finishes on his record.
He tailed off slightly in the later part of the 2000’s but Lloyd was very consistent throughout his prime years which saw him earn £559,905 and crack the top 5 in earnings.
That’s a testament to his ability even if you don’t consider him to be the 5th best player of that decade.
4) John Part – £598,850
Darth Maple has a record in the 2000’s that put him in the ‘elite’ player category.
A two-time world champion in 2003 and 2008, Part also won the Las Vegas Classic in 2006 and was a runner-up in no fewer than seven PDC major finals.
What’s strange about John Part is that he won the 1994 BDO World Championship seemingly out of nowhere, yet it wasn’t until the early 2000’s when he would start to hit his prime making it to the final of the 2001 PDC World Championship.
Throughout the 1990’s Part didn’t make much impact in the UK but he more than made up for it when things finally started to click for the Canadian.
Making just shy of £600k during the decade meant that he more than justified his career choice away from his home country.
3) James Wade – £698,705
It’s 2025 and James Wade is still making it to finals of PDC major tournaments, despite being one of the highest earning darts players two decades prior!
It’s certainly been an accomplished and lucrative career for The Machine who’s one of the highest earners in darts of all time.
Seen as an exciting young talent in the early 2000’s, it wasn’t long before Wade established himself as more than a prospect.
A runner-up finish in the 2006 World Matchplay was followed by securing the title in the same tournament just a year later.
Wade would also win the 2007 World Grand Prix, 2008 UK Open, 2009 Premier League and had a handful of runner-up finishes in that second part of the 2000’s.
From 2007-2012 Wade was the third highest ranked player in darts, reaching as high as second in 2010.
His consistency allowed Wade to become one of a few darts players to really make a comfortable living from darts before the major money came in.
2) Raymond van Barneveld – £810,690
From 1995-2006, Raymond van Barneveld destroyed the BDO circuit making it to 17 x major finals and winning 14 titles in the process.
This included four BDO World Championship titles which makes him the second most successful BDO winner behind Eric Bristow.
When Barney FINALLY moved to the PDC, many wondered whether he could see similar success in this division. While he wasn’t as dominant, his position on this list should tell you how well he made the transition!
Between 2006-2009 he went to ten PDC major finals and won four of them. This included the 2007 PDC World Championship where he beat Phil Taylor in one of the greatest darts matches of all time.
He couldn’t quite make it to the million in prize money mark (maybe due to such a delay in switching divisions) but Raymond van Barneveld still made more than anyone else during this era with the exception of one anomoly…
1) Phil Taylor – £2,968,950
It’s probably no surprise to see the greatest darts player of all time top another list but Phil Taylor really shows how dominant he was with his earning figure on this list.
Phil Taylor made just under £3 million in prize money alone in the 2000’s (this article excludes sponsorship or exhibition money) and just under 3.5x more than the second highest earner in RVB.
That gap is staggering.
No player could make a million in prize money over that decade, yet Taylor nearly made it 3x over 🤯
The reason why is obvious though. From 2000-2009 he won 43 major titles from 56 total tournaments.
See more 👉 6 RIDICULOUS Phil Taylor records that will never be broken
During this decade Taylor won 76.7% of all major tournaments among professional darts players in the PDC. He basically cleaned up.
During 2009 he also won every ranking major title possible.
This was one of the most dominant runs in professional sport and while prize money wasn’t near the level it is today, Phil Taylor was able to become incredibly wealthy by being the best of the best.
Still, bet he wishes he was in his prime years when the £1 million World Championship prize fund was on offer.
His 2009 title earned him £125,000, just £5000 more than the 2025 European Championship won by Gian van Veen recently!
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