Around the Clock rules: 1 to 20, in order
Around the Clock is the first game anybody is taught and the last one anybody stops practising: hit the one, then the two, then the three, all the way to the twenty. First round the board wins.
How it works
Every player starts on the 1. Three darts a visit; each dart that lands in your current number moves you up to the next one, and you keep going with the darts you have left.
So a visit of three hits moves you three numbers. A visit with nothing in it moves you nowhere — unless you are playing the slip rule below.
The first player past the last rung of the ladder wins the leg. On the classic ladder that is the twenty; capped with the bull, it is the bull.
Any bed, doubles, or trebles
The pub game counts any bed on the number: a single one, a double one and a treble one all move you to the two.
Doubles only is the practice routine that matters, because a full lap is twenty doubles and that is the half of the board that finishes X01 legs. Trebles only is the same idea for the scoring ring, and it is brutal.
Which ladder
Up is the classic 1 → 20. Down runs 20 → 1, which is harder than it sounds because the small numbers are the ones nobody practises.
Round the wire follows the board as it is actually laid out — 20, 1, 18, 4, 13, 6 … — so every rung is a neighbour of the last and no throw crosses the face.
Shuffled deals the twenty numbers fresh at the start of the game. It is the one ladder nobody has muscle memory for, because on 1 → 20 and 20 → 1 you know the next target before it is shown.
Any of the four can be capped with a final bull rung, which is how the routine really finishes.
House rules this board plays
The part no other rules page has, because no other site implements them. Each one opens the setup screen with that rule already set.
- Doubles, finished on the bull A full lap of the twenty doubles and then the bull to close it out — the practice routine as it is actually run. Set it up →
- Round the wire The ladder follows the board’s own layout — 20, 1, 18, 4 … — so nothing crosses the face and every rung is next door to the last. Set it up →
- Jump rules, and a bonus visit Darts are entered one at a time: a double skips a number, a treble skips two. Land all three and you throw again. Set it up →
- A shuffled ladder you can slip down The twenty numbers dealt fresh, and a visit with nothing in it drops you back a rung — which is what makes a number worth being frightened of. Set it up →
- Down the board The same ladder run backwards, 20 → 1, over the numbers nobody throws at on purpose. Set it up →
Common questions
- What is Around the Clock in darts? Hit the 1, then the 2, then the 3, all the way to the 20, three darts a visit. Each dart in your current number moves you up one, and the first player past the last rung wins.
- Do you have to hit doubles in Around the Clock? Not in the pub game, where any bed on the number counts. Doubles only is the practice routine that matters, because a full lap is twenty doubles and that is the half of the board that finishes X01 legs.
- What order do the numbers come in? Up the board 1 to 20, down it 20 to 1, round the wire in the board's own layout of 20, 1, 18, 4, or shuffled and dealt fresh so nobody has muscle memory for the ladder.
Play it
Around the Clock is one of the twenty modes in Friendly Fire Casper, a free darts scoreboard that runs in a browser and keeps working when the wifi drops. It scores the game for you, undoes the dart you typed wrong, remembers who won, and can put the board on a TV while everybody scores from their own phone.