In my opinion, the best poker sites for US players are those that have a long history of trust, are free of scandals, and have found a way to pay out American players consistently. My current top 3 poker sites offering real-money play to US players are Bovada Poker, Global Poker, and Ignition Poker. Home » Poker News » Italy’s Gambling Market Up 11.4% in 2016 Friday, March 24th, 2017 Written by Charles Washington News out of Italy suggests that its gambling industry is thriving, with the market generating revenues of €19.17 billion in 2016.
For the last eight years, the largest tournament in the world has been the World Series of Poker Main Event. With the exception of 1992, the US$10,000 buy-in tournament increased in prize pool year-over-year from its start in 1970 until 2007 (the latter a result of the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act of 2006, which reduced the number of players winning their seats via online play).
The first tournament to reach a million dollar prize pool was the 1983 WSOP Main Event. The WSOP Main Event of 2004 had the first prize pool of above $10,000,000.
The largest non Hold'em Tournament has been the 2008 WSOP $50K HORSE with a prize pool of $7,104,000 and the first prize of $1,989,120 going to Scotty Nguyen.[1]
Below are the 30 largest poker tournaments with respect to the prize pool in United States dollars and not number of entrants. This list includes live and online poker.
Currently, 14 of the 15 largest prize pools in history have been WSOP Main Events. The second largest prize pool outside of the Main Event is the 2012 WSOP event known as The Big One for One Drop, held from July 1–3. It featured a buy-in of US$1 million, the largest in poker history. Of the buy-in, $111,111 was a charitable donation to the One Drop Foundation, and the WSOP took no rake. All 48 seats available for that event were filled, resulting in a prize pool of $42,666,672, with over 5 million dollars donated.[2] The second largest pool for any event outside of the WSOP was the 2012 Macau High Stakes Challenge, with a HK$2 million (US$260,000) buy-in plus a rebuy option. The event drew a field of 73, of which 21 made a rebuy, resulting in a prize pool of HK$182,360,000 (slightly over US$23.5 million).[3]
All of the 30 richest tournaments to date were played in No Limit Hold'em.
Event | Prize Pool (US$) | Winner | 1st Prize | Ref. |
---|---|---|---|---|
2006 WSOP Main Event | $82,512,162 | Jamie Gold | $12,000,000 | [4][5] |
2019 WSOP Main Event | $80,548,600 | Hossein Ensan | $10,000,000 | [6] |
2018 WSOP Main Event | $74,015,600 | John Cynn | $8,800,000 | [7] |
2010 WSOP Main Event | $68,799,059 | Jonathan Duhamel | $8,944,310 | [8] |
2017 WSOP Main Event | $67,877,400 | Scott Blumstein | $8,150,000 | [9] |
2019 Triton Super High Roller Series - Triton Million | $65,660,000 (£54,000,000) | Aaron Zang | $16,775,820* (£13,779,491) | [10] |
2019 Triton Super High Roller Series - Triton Million | $65,660,000 (£54,000,000) | Bryn Kenney* | $20,563,324* (£16,775,820) (2nd place) | [10] |
2011 WSOP Main Event | $64,531,000 | Pius Heinz | $8,711,956 | [11] |
2008 WSOP Main Event | $64,333,600 | Peter Eastgate | $9,152,416 | [12] |
2016 WSOP Main Event | $63,327,800 | Qui Nguyen | $8,005,310 | [13] |
2014 WSOP Main Event | $62,820,200 | Martin Jacobson | $10,000,000 | [14] |
2012 WSOP Main Event | $62,021,200 | Greg Merson | $8,527,982 | [15] |
2009 WSOP Main Event | $61,043,600 | Joe Cada | $8,547,042 | [16] |
2015 WSOP Main Event | $60,348,000 | Joe McKeehen | $7,680,021 | [17] |
2007 WSOP Main Event | $59,784,954 | Jerry Yang | $8,250,000 | [18] |
2013 WSOP Main Event | $59,708,800 | Ryan Riess | $8,359,531 | [19] |
2005 WSOP Main Event | $52,818,610 | Joe Hachem | $7,500,000 | [20] |
2012 WSOP Event 55 – The Big One for One Drop | $42,666,672 | Antonio Esfandiari | $18,346,673 | [21] |
2014 WSOP Event 57 – The Big One for One Drop | $37,333,338 | Dan Colman | $15,306,668 | [22] |
2016 Monte-Carlo One Drop Extravaganza | $27,437,564 | Elton Tsang | $12,248,912 | [23] |
2019 PokerStars NL Hold'em Players Championship | $26,455,500 | Ramon Colillas | $5,100,000 | [24] |
2018 WSOP Event 78 – The Big One for One Drop | $24,840,000 | Justin Bonomo | $10,000,000 | [25] |
2004 WSOP Main Event | $24,224,400 | Greg Raymer | $5,000,000 | [26] |
2012 Macau High Stakes Challenge Super High Roller | $23,511,128 | Stanley Choi | $6,465,560 | [27] |
Super High Roller Bowl 2015 | $21,500,000 | Brian Rast | $7,525,000 | [28] |
2016 WSOP Event 67 – High Roller for One Drop | $19,316,565 | Fedor Holz | $4,981,775 | [29] |
2013 WSOP Event 47 – One Drop High Roller | $17,891,148 | Anthony Gregg | $4,830,619 | [30] |
Super High Roller Bowl 2017 | $16,800,000 | Christoph Vogelsang | $6,000,000 | [31] |
2007 WPT Championship | $15,495,750 | Carlos Mortensen | $3,970,415 | [32] |
2013 GuangDong Ltd Asia Millions Main Event | $15,376,897 | Niklas Heinecker | $4,456,885 | [33] |
2011 Pokerstars Caribbean Adventure | $15,132,000 | Galen Hall | $2,300,000 | [34] |
* | Due to a prize splitting deal Aaron Zang received £13,779,491 ($16,775,820) for 1st, original payout for 1st was £19,000,000 ($23,100,000). Bryn Kenney received a larger cash prize of £16,775,820 ($20,563,324) for 2nd place. |