The World Series of Poker (WSOP) released its 2025 schedule, featuring 100 bracelet events.
The 56th edition of the world’s largest poker series will begin on May 27th and run through July 16th. This will be the fourth year the event will be held at the Horseshoe Las Vegas and Paris Las Vegas.
It will be the first year that the storied event will be run by its new owners GGPoker.
Last year, the summer series attracted 229,553 entrants and awarded more than $438 million in prize money. The 2024 Main Event also had a record number of entries for the tournament. WSOP CEO Ty Stewart believes this year could be even bigger.
“We had hoped to continue to break records last year – and we did – the WSOP Main Event was bigger than ever,” said Stewart.
“In 2025, the WSOP schedule is better again, with something for everyone who loves the game. There’s nothing like summer in Las Vegas and we’re ready to welcome players to the biggest and best WSOP of all time.”
With buy-ins starting as low as $500 and as high as $250,000, the series offers something for almost every poker player.
This year, the series continues to feature a $1,500 buy-in, five-day, Millionaire Maker No Limit Hold’em event, which has become a favorite. It will also offer several bounty tournaments, which have grown in popularity.
However, the schedule has been met with some criticism.
Rakes, Re-Entries, and Longer Events Top Complaints
What is immediately apparent is the tournament rake - or fee - has gone up for many of the events. Unlike other professional sports, sponsors do not put up the prize money. Prize money for poker tournaments is paid for with the players’ tournament buy-ins. The rake is what is taken out of the prize pool by the event’s organizers to fund tournament operations.
Not all the event structure sheets have been published, but it looks like many tournaments will get dinged another 0.5% of rake, on average. For example, the rake for $500 events is now 17%, up 1% from last year. The rake for $1,500 events is up 0.5% to 11.5%.
Also, the number of re-buy – or re-entry – tournaments is high again this year. The ability for a player to re-buy into an event after they bust out is unpopular among recreational players. Re-entry events tend to favor professional and wealthy players, who can afford to enter multiple times.
Meanwhile, the length of tournaments – specifically the Main Event – is getting a lot of attention this year. Multi-day tournaments can be grueling, requiring back-to-back 12-hour days of play. This week, 17-time WSOP bracelet winner Phil Hellmuth posted a video on X, saying that he won’t play the Main Event this year, due to its length.
I am not playing the @WSOP Main Event. It has become an “Endurance contest.”
— phil_hellmuth (@phil_hellmuth) February 18, 2025
I truly believe that 80% of the players want changes made to the @WSOP Main Event. 12 hour days, or longer, for 6-7 days in row, is brutal and disproportionately affects older players pic.twitter.com/7K4OcJOZ56
Hellmuth was the youngest player to win the Main Event back in 1989 – a record that stood until 2008. Back then, the tournament hosted 178 players. While Hellmuth has played – and won – many large tournaments since then, he believes the Main Event has become more of an “endurance contest” than a measure of skill. Hellmuth will turn 61 during this year’s Main Event. But there is plenty of time for him to change his mind before they “shuffle up and deal.”
WSOP Background
The WSOP was started by Benny Binion in 1970. But it wasn’t until the following year that Binion introduced a main event freezeout tournament, which has become the cornerstone of the series. In 1971, six players vied for the championship. Last year, 10,112 players, from all over the globe, gathered to play the championship event.
Caesars Entertainment obtained the rights to the WSOP in 2004. After 20 years of running the tournament, Caesars sold the rights to GGPoker, an online poker company that had collaborated with Ceasars in the years running up to the sale.
In August 2024, NSUS Group, GGPoker’s parent company, bought the intellectual rights to the WSOP for $500 million. Of that $250 million was paid up front and the other $250 million is due in 2029. Per the sales agreement, NSUS will continue to host the WSOP at Caesars Las Vegas casinos through 2045.
