Entries for the 2026 Winmau World Masters Preliminary Rounds have been confirmed ahead of this week’s £500,000 event in Milton Keynes.
A total of 122 players will be competing for eight places in the Winmau World Masters on Wednesday January 28, with the Preliminary Rounds being held at Arena MK.
The top 24 players from the PDC Werner Rankings Ladder are exempt through to the televised stage of the Winmau World Masters, which takes place from Thursday January 29-Sunday February 1, with all remaining Tour Card Holders able to compete in the Preliminary Rounds.
They are joined by invited players from the PDC's 2025 secondary and affiliate tours, as well as four representatives from the JDC Advanced Tour.
The Preliminary Rounds will see the highest-ranked 32 players in action seeded through to the Last 64, where they will be joined by 32 Group Winners from the round-robin stage.
The Group Stage will see 32 players seeded as one per group, with the remaining players drawn at random to the groups.
There will be a number of high-profile stars battling it out in Wednesday's Preliminary Rounds, including two-time World Champion Peter Wright, who lifted the Masters title in Milton Keynes in 2020.
Former World Champion Michael Smith also makes his return to big stage action at Arena MK, alongside 2022 Masters winner Joe Cullen and last year's World Masters semi-finalist Dimitri Van den Bergh.
Dutch duo Wessel Nijman and Dirk van Duijvenbode will also feature, with World Championship quarter-finalists Krzysztof Ratajski and Justin Hood back in action following their impressive Alexandra Palace exploits.
Five-time World Champion Raymond van Barneveld will be one of seven Tour Card Holders not competing in Milton Keynes, with Mickey Mansell, Ryan Meikle, Maximilian Czerwinski, Adam Leek, Jurjen van der Velde, Filip Bereza and Matthias Ehlers also absent.
The Preliminary Rounds will be played over the best of five sets, best of three legs per set, and darts fans worldwide will be able to watch action from two boards broadcast live on PDCTV, with play commencing from 1200 GMT.
The draw will be made at 1100 GMT on Wednesday, with live scoring available through DartConnect.
2026 Winmau World Masters
Top 24 Players – Exempt to Round One
Luke Littler
Luke Humphries
Gian van Veen
Michael van Gerwen
Jonny Clayton
Gary Anderson
Stephen Bunting
Ryan Searle
Josh Rock
Danny Noppert
James Wade
Gerwyn Price
Chris Dobey
Nathan Aspinall
Martin Schindler
Ross Smith
Damon Heta
Jermaine Wattimena
Mike De Decker
Rob Cross
Luke Woodhouse
Dave Chisnall
Daryl Gurney
Ryan Joyce
Remaining PDC Tour Card Holders
1-32 Exempt to Last 64
1. Dimitri Van den Bergh
2. Cameron Menzies
3. Ritchie Edhouse
4. Krzysztof Ratajski
5. Wessel Nijman
6. Dirk van Duijvenbode
7. Peter Wright
8. Michael Smith
9. Andrew Gilding
10. Ricardo Pietreczko
11. Joe Cullen
12. Martin Lukeman
13. Kevin Doets
14. Callan Rydz
15. Ricky Evans
16. Brendan Dolan
17. Niels Zonneveld
18. William O'Connor
19. Scott Williams
20. Madars Razma
21. Gabriel Clemens
22. James Hurrell
23. Connor Scutt
24. Justin Hood
25. Jeffrey de Graaf
26. Ian White
27. Alan Soutar
28. Niko Springer
29. Mensur Suljovic
30. Richard Veenstra
31. Keane Barry
32. Nick Kenny
Next 32 players seeded to groups
1. Kim Huybrechts
2. Thibault Tricole
3. Lukas Wenig
4. Rob Owen
5. Mario Vandenbogaerde
6. Karel Sedlacek
7. Bradley Brooks
8. Cam Crabtree
9. Wesley Plaisier
10. Sebastian Bialecki
11. Max Hopp
12. Adam Lipscombe
13. Dominik Gruellich
14. Cor Dekker
15. Maik Kuivenhoven
16. Andy Boulton
17. Tavis Dudeney
18. Oskar Lukasiak
19. Darryl Pilgrim
20. Tom Bissell
21. Christian Kist
22. Leon Weber
23. Dennie Olde Kalter
24. Jim Long
25. Thomas Lovely
26. Marvin van Velzen
27. Viktor Tingstrom
28. Adam Warner
29. Greg Ritchie
30. Adam Paxton
31. Tytus Kanik
32. Stefaan Henderyck
Remaining players unseeded
Rusty-Jake Rodriguez
Pero Ljubic
Kai Gotthardt
Stefan Bellmont
Darius Labanauskas
Beau Greaves
Owen Bates
Rhys Griffin
Carl Sneyd
Niall Culleton
Tom Sykes
Shane McGuirk
Charlie Manby
Samuel Price
Stephen Burton
Mervyn King
Tyler Thorpe
Stephen Rosney
David Sharp
Arno Merk
Jeffrey Sparidaans
Cristo Reyes
Yorick Hofkens
Jeffrey de Zwaan
Sietse Lap
Jimmy van Schie
Chris Landman
Marvin Kraft
Benjamin Pratnemer
Adam Gawlas
Alexander Merkx
Pascal Rupprecht
Additional Invited Players
2025 Development Tour
Jamai van den Herik
Ryan Branley
James Beeton
Jenson Walker
Patrik Williams
Nathan Potter
Henry Coates
2025 Challenge Tour
Ted Evetts
Jack Tweddell
Sam Spivey
Scott Waites
Scott Campbell
Danny van Trijp
Graham Hall
2025 Women’s Series
Fallon Sherrock
Lisa Ashton
2025 PDCNB Tour
Andreas Harrysson
Teemu Harju
Andreas Hyllgaardhus
2025 CDC Tour
Gary Mawson
2025 CDLC Tour
Jesus Salate
Roberto Wentz
2025 JDC Advanced Tour
Archie Self
Mason Teese
Nico Bado
Taylor McGuckian
Draw Bracket for Last 64 onwards
For the knockout phase of the event, matches will be in the following bracket order:
Seed 1 v Winner Group 32
Seed 32 v Winner Group 1
Seed 16 v Winner Group 17
Seed 17 v Winner Group 16
Seed 8 v Winner Group 25
Seed 25 v Winner Group 8
Seed 9 v Winner Group 24
Seed 24 v Winner Group 9
Seed 4 v Winner Group 29
Seed 29 v Winner Group 4
Seed 13 v Winner Group 20
Seed 20 v Winner Group 13
Seed 5 v Winner Group 28
Seed 28 v Winner Group 5
Seed 12 v Winner Group 21
Seed 21 v Winner Group 12
Seed 2 v Winner Group 31
Seed 31 v Winner Group 2
Seed 15 v Winner Group 18
Seed 18 v Winner Group 15
Seed 7 v Winner Group 26
Seed 26 v Winner Group 7
Seed 10 v Winner Group 23
Seed 23 v Winner Group 10
Seed 3 v Winner Group 30
Seed 30 v Winner Group 3
Seed 14 v Winner Group 19
Seed 19 v Winner Group 14
Seed 6 v Winner Group 27
Seed 27 v Winner Group 6
Seed 11 v Winner Group 22
Seed 22 v Winner Group 11