| Tournament Name: | 2018 European Darts Open |
| Dates: | 23–25 March 2018 |
| Venue: | Ostermann-Arena |
| Location: | Leverkusen |
| Organisation: | PDC |
| Format: | Legs |
| Prize Fund: | £135,000 |
| Winners Share: | £25,000 |
| High Checkout: | 170  Simon Whitlock (third round) Michael van Gerwen (quarter-finals) Peter Wright (semi-finals) |
| Winner: | Michael van Gerwen |
| Next: | Event 2 |
The 2018 European Darts Open was the first of thirteen PDC European Tour events on the 2018 PDC Pro Tour. The tournament took place at Ostermann-Arena, Leverkusen, Germany, between 23–25 March 2018. It featured a field of 48 players and £135,000 in prize money, with £25,000 going to the winner.
This was the first event in the PDC European Tour where the format of the semi-finals and final were slightly altered. As in previous years, the first 3 rounds of action, plus the quarter-finals were all best of 11 legs matches, but the semi-finals became best of 13 legs matches, and the final became a best of 15 legs match.
Peter Wright was the defending champion after defeating Mervyn King 6–2 in the final of the 2017 tournament. He reached the final of this tournament, but he was defeated by Michael van Gerwen 8–7 in the first best of 15 legs final.[1]
This is how the prize money is divided:
| Stage (num. of players) | Prize money | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Winner | align=center | (1) | align=center | £25,000 |
| Runner-up | align=center | (1) | align=center | £10,000 |
| Semi-finalists | align=center | (2) | align=center | £6,000 |
| Quarter-finalists | align=center | (4) | align=center | £4,000 |
| Third round losers | align=center | (8) | align=center | £3,000 |
| Second round losers | align=center | (16) | align=center | £2,000 |
| First round losers | align=center | (16) | align=center | £1,000 |
| Total | align=center colspan=2 | £135,000 | ||
The top 16 entrants from the PDC ProTour Order of Merit on 6 February will automatically qualify for the event and will be seeded in the second round.
The remaining 32 places will go to players from five qualifying events – 18 from the UK Qualifier (held in Barnsley on 16 February), eight from the West/South European Qualifier (held on 22 March), four from the Host Nation Qualifier (held on 22 March), one from the Nordic & Baltic Qualifier (held on 26 January) and one from the East European Qualifier (held on 26 January).
The following players will take part in the tournament:
Top 16[4]
Mensur Suljović (third round) Simon Whitlock (quarter-finals)
Kim Huybrechts (second round) Kyle Anderson (second round)UK Qualifier[5]
West/South European Qualifier[6]
Michael Rasztovits (first round) Dimitri Van den Bergh (first round)Host Nation Qualifier[6]
Nordic & Baltic Qualifier
Marko Kantele (second round) [7]East European Qualifier
Tytus Kanik (second round) [8]