For the last several 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 aboveR$10,000,000.
The largest non Hold'em Tournament has been
🧲 the 2008 WSOPR$50K HORSE with a prize pool ofR$7,104,000 and the first prize
ofR$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,R$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 ofR$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.
* 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.
