Darts Tips: Timing the Two Sweeps and Scoring Past Round 10

Updated October 2026

In Darts you never throw anything. You stop two moving markers, one for the left-right position and one for the up-down position, and the dart appears where the two choices meet. That makes the game a pure timing test, and timing tests reward players who know exactly what the markers do. This guide lays out the real scoring zones, the speed of the sweeps in every round, how the round bonus changes your priorities, and a practical method for stopping each bar where you want it.

The scoring zones are smaller than the board

The board is drawn as a set of circles, and the scoring is measured purely by distance from the centre as a fraction of the board's radius. The red bullseye covers the inner tenth of the radius and pays 50. The amber-brown ring out to 22 percent pays 25. The dark red ring out to 46 percent pays 10. The lighter green ring out to 70 percent pays 5.

Everything beyond 70 percent of the radius is a miss, even though it is still painted as part of the board in a darker green. That outer band is more than half of the visible board area, so it catches many players who think a dart near the edge will at least score something. A dart there earns nothing and costs one of your three lives, exactly as if it had flown past the board. Treat the boundary between the light green and dark green as the real edge of the target.

On a typical 390-pixel-wide phone the board radius works out to about 143 pixels, so the scoring disc is about 200 pixels across, the 10 ring about 130, the 25 ring about 63 and the bullseye under 30. The board scales with your screen, but those proportions stay the same.

How the two sweeps move

Each dart starts with a marker sliding along the track under the board. It always starts at the left end moving right, travels at a constant speed, and bounces instantly at each end. There is no slowing down near the ends. Tap anywhere on the game area to freeze it; the guide line rising from the marker shows the column you chose. Then a second marker begins at the top of the track on the left side of the board, moving down, and your next tap fixes the row. The dart lands where the two lines cross.

Both markers use the same speed. The horizontal track is slightly wider than the board and the vertical track exactly matches the board's height, so the two phases are almost identical in difficulty. The speed is 220 pixels per second in round 1 and is multiplied by 1.1 each new round, without any upper limit. That gives about 322 pixels per second in round 5, 519 in round 10, 836 in round 15 and 1,345 in round 20.

In time terms, on the 143-pixel board the marker spends about 0.9 seconds crossing the scoring disc in round 1, about 0.39 seconds in round 10 and about 0.15 seconds in round 20. The bullseye width is crossed in roughly 0.13, 0.055 and 0.021 seconds respectively. By the late teens, the bullseye is effectively a lottery and even the 25 ring needs excellent timing.

How a run is scored

A round is three darts. After the third dart lands, you receive a bonus of 30 times the round number, the round counter goes up, and the sweep speeds up. You start with three lives and there is no way to win them back. The run ends when the last one is gone, and if that happens on the third dart of a round, that round's bonus is not paid.

The bonus is the key to big scores. Three bullseyes in a round are worth 150 points, a figure that never grows. The bonus, by contrast, is 30 in round 1, 150 in round 5 and 300 in round 10. The bonuses from the first ten rounds add up to 1,650 points by themselves. A player who lands safe 10s and 5s and simply survives longer will usually beat a player who chases the 50 early and loses lives.

So the right target changes during a run. In the first few rounds, the sweeps are slow enough that the 25 ring is a reasonable everyday target and the bullseye a fair gamble. Once the speed has roughly doubled, around round 8, a dart anywhere in the scoring disc is a good result, and protecting your lives matters more than any single ring.

Lock the column first, and lock it near the centre

Because the scoring area is a circle, the column you choose decides how much room you have for the row. If the first marker stops dead centre, the scoring disc is about 200 pixels tall at that column. If it stops 70 pixels off centre, only about 140 pixels of that column still score. Stop it 95 pixels out and you have barely 60 pixels left, making the second tap far harder.

This means the horizontal tap deserves more care than the vertical one. If you are not happy with the marker's position, let it bounce and come back; the sweep keeps going until you tap, and there is no clock. Taking an extra pass costs nothing but a moment, while a column near the edge of the disc can cost a life. Only once the column is near centre should you think about how ambitious the row tap can be.

A timing method that holds up as speed rises

Reacting to the marker when it reaches the centre is too late at higher speeds, because the delay between seeing and tapping is a fixed slice of time while the marker gets faster. Two techniques help.

• Use the fixed start. Every dart's horizontal marker begins at the same left end moving right, and every vertical marker begins at the top moving down, at a known speed for the round. The first approach to the centre therefore always takes the same time within a round. Learn that rhythm with the first dart of the round and repeat it for the other two.
• Watch the bounce, not the target. When the marker is on its way back, it reaches the centre a fixed time after bouncing. Starting a mental count at the bounce is more consistent than chasing the marker with your eyes.

Tap with a light, quick touch. The game reads the position at the instant your finger goes down, not when you lift it, so a hesitant press that lands late will push the dart past where you wanted it.

Common mistakes

• Trusting the dark green band. It looks like part of the board but it is a miss and costs a life.
• Accepting a bad column. An off-centre first lock shrinks the window for the second. Let the marker make another pass.
• Chasing bullseyes late. After round 10 the round bonus dwarfs the difference between rings. A life is worth more than 25 extra points.
• Tapping during the result. For a short moment after each dart, and between rounds, taps are ignored. Wait for the marker to start moving before you begin your count.

A practice plan

1. Play several runs aiming only for the scoring disc, never the bullseye, and note which round you reach.
2. Practise letting the first marker pass when it is off centre, until skipping a bad pass feels natural.
3. Learn the opening rhythm for each round, starting your count when the marker appears.
4. Once you reliably reach round 10, start taking the 25 ring in the early rounds where the sweep is slow.

Your best score is saved on this device when a run ends, and any score above zero can be sent to the Hall of Fame from the final card. Steady scoring rings and an extra round of bonus will take you further than any single perfect dart.