Here’s a championship sporting event for Las Vegas that serious beer drinkers can get behind.
The Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority board of directors on Tuesday unanimously approved spending $450,000 to sponsor the Las Vegas World Masters Darts Championship and Beer Festival in July over three years.
The first year of the event, to be hosted by the Rio, is scheduled July 14-19 and it will return in July 2027 and 2028.
It’s the first time the international competition will be staged in the United States. A prize pot of $86,850 will be distributed over the six days of the event.
“It introduces a niche sports event to the versatility that Las Vegas and Clark County can provide to their program, which really compounds the benefit and the value of hosting the World Masters Darts Championships in our destination,” said Jennifer Hawkins, vice president of sports business development for the LVCVA.
The 2026 competition will be the 50th edition of the event, which will feature divisions for men, women, youth and girls.
The 2025-26 competition occurred in December and January at Alexandra Palace in London. Nineteen-year-old Luke “The Nuke” Littler is the two-time defending world champion of the World Darts Championship.
Littler is an English competitor from Warrington, Cheshire, and is the youngest world darts champion in the sport’s history.
The LVCVA sponsorship of the event is for $150,000 each year over the next three years.
LVCVA officials said collectively, the three championship events are expected to attract more than 50,000 visitors and generate 35,000 incremental room nights during critical summer need periods. The event is projected to attract approximately 3,000-5,000 dart players per year, with an estimated 70 percent of participants traveling from international markets.
Room nights connected to the championship events will be distributed across multiple resort properties in the destination. The sponsorship will provide the LVCVA with advertising, marketing, and hospitality opportunities before, during and after the championship events.
Contact Richard N. Velotta at rvelotta@reviewjournal.com or 702-477-3893. Follow @RickVelotta on X.
