Have you ever wondered what poker tournaments are the most popular in the world? Here are the five biggest poker tournaments that attract hundreds of thousands of players every year and are famous even outside the circles of poker fans.
Taking part in poker tournaments is one of the greatest experiences poker players can ever have. They open up plenty of opportunities like getting in touch with poker pros, learning new techniques, winning lots of money, and just having fun. Nowadays, poker tournaments are held both online and offline. Let’s see which ones are the most prestigious to join in 2022.
In addition, you can find invitations to online poker events if you follow our page with the best online poker promotions.
Top-5 biggest poker tournaments in the world
To define the five favorites among all popular poker events, we’ve looked at the following criteria: the overall coverage of the tournament, the level of prestige, the total number of participants, and the total amount of winnings. All these factors combined make up our top-5. So, are you ready to learn what are the five biggest poker tournaments in the world?
World Series of Poker
Of course, the World Series of Poker is the most popular and prestigious poker tournament around. Founded in the 1970s, WSOP is a series of events that features many variants of poker with Texas Hold’Em taking the central spot. The highlight is the WSOP Main Event, a $10,000 buy-in tournament, where the winner is defined and awarded the bracelet. Besides that, the best player takes a prize that can reach millions of dollars. The record-breaking WSOP prize of $12 million was won by Jamie Gold in the 2006 WSOP tournament. After all, the World Series of Poker is a meeting point for the best professional poker players in the world.
World Poker Tour Championship
In 2002, the World Poker Tour was first hosted as an international poker tournament. Since then, the WPT has always entered various tops of the most popular poker events. The events are held across the world, while the winners of the WPT Main Tour are awarded a membership to the WPT Champions Club, besides the prize pool. Considering that the maximum buy-in at the WPT was $25,000, you can imagine how much its participants could win.
European Poker Tour
The European Poker Tour is one of the biggest poker tournaments. Also referred to as EPT, this is a European analog to the World Poker Tour. The European Poker Tour is held among poker players from Europe and is owned by PokerStars.
The EPT differs from the WPT by the number of players at the table (six versus eight). Also, the buy-in for most events is around €8,000. The biggest final prize pool at the ETP was $6,5 million, of which more than $1 million went to the winner.
Triton Poker Series
The Triton Poker Series is a popular series of high-stakes poker tournaments that are held in various locations all over the world and broadcast on the Internet & TV. This tournament is well-known due to its super high stakes that can reach millions. For example, the largest-ever TPS offered $65 million as the prize pool. This year’s Triton Poker Series has just come to the end. The tournament was over on May 25th with Bryn Kenney winning more than $30 million single-handedly.
World Championship of Online Poker
The most popular online poker tournament is undoubtedly the World Championship of Online Poker (WCOOP). Owned by PokerStars, this tourney is often called the Internet analog to the WSOP and the largest-ever poker event. Like WSOP, its online equivalent includes various poker variants. It was even giving away bracelets until 2015. The tournament offers quite modest prize pools in comparison to offline events. However, what’s good about the WCOOP is that almost everyone can become a winner and earn hundreds of dollars without even leaving home.