Top Five WSOP Tournaments with Biggest Prize Pools
The WSOP is home to some of the biggest poker tournaments in the world, making it a must-visit destination for any fans of tournament poker. The jewel in its crown is the WSOP Main Event, which has experienced almost consistent growth throughout its 55+-year history. In fact, the Main Event takes all five spots on the top 5 list of the world’s biggest poker tournaments by prize pool, which extends to ten out of the top 10 list, if you count the WSOP Paradise Super Main Event!
In this article, we’ll look at the largest WSOP prize pools in history, recapping the action from each event. a new record. And that Main Event became the largest prize pool in all of poker history.
Top Five Prize Pools in WSOP History
We’ll start our run-down of the WSOP’s biggest prize pools with the fifth-largest, working our way up to the biggest event in poker history.
5th Largest WSOP Prize Pool: $80,782,475 in the 2022 Main Event
One of the most positive years for the World Series of Poker was 2022;the pandemic was mostly in the rearview mirror, and the series finally moved from the Rio after 17 years and landed on the Las Vegas Strip. The WSOP set up at Bally’s Las Vegas (now Horseshoe Las Vegas) and Paris Las Vegas, two casinos that connected indoors and provided two convention areas for poker. Players were excited for all of it, and it showed in the attendance.
The Main Event that year was spectacular, as the 8,663 player count came very close to beating the 2006 record. The prize pool totalled a whopping $80,782,475, enough to pay out the top 1,300 players (Technically, they paid the top 1,302 players, with three of them splitting the $15K min-cash.) The playdown to the final table was exciting, as Damian Salas (the 2020 champ) made it to 27th place and longtime pro Kenny Tran to 17th. The final table itself lacked any notable tournament names, as each player has less than $1 million in tournament earnings before the event. In the end, Espen Jorstad of Norway won the tournament, bracelet, beating out Autralia’s Adrian Attenborough heads-up to take home $10 million.
4th Largest WSOP Prize Pool: $82,512,162 in the 2006 Main Event
The 2006 World Series of Poker took place at the height of the poker boom. In the nearly three years that passed since Chris Moneymaker won the WSOP Main Event, the Main Event had 10x’d in size, growing from 839 players in 2003 to over 8,700 players in 2006. Players from all over the world had been flocking to Vegas and winning their way to the World Series via online satellites.
The 8,773-player field was a Main Event record that would stand for nearly 20 years, creating a prize pool of $82,512,162. The last 873 players standing received payouts, and the last few tables included names like Humberto Brenes, Eric Lynch, Kevin O’Donnell, Prahlad Friedman, David Einhorn, and Jeff Lisandro. The final table was full of character and action, with poker legend Allen Cunningham favorite to take down the whole thing, but the speech play of Jamie Gold led the way to victory and a $12 million prize.
3rd Largest WSOP Prize Pool: $90,535,500 in the 2025 Main Event
After the huge turnouts of the 2023 and 2024 Main Event (spoiler alert for what’s up ahead!), it was expected that the 2025 Main Event would bring the WSOP “back down to Earth.” Getting back-to-back-to-back 10,000+ player fields would be some feat, but the total entrants of 9,735 showed that there’s still plenty of appetite for the Main Event in the poker community!
Coming into the Main Event, undoubtedly the biggest stories were Leo Margets and Michael Mizrachi. Leo was the first female player to reach the WSOP Main Event final table since Barbara Enright in 1995, and put up a valiant performance, finishing 7th for $1.5 million.
Mizrachi was coming into the Main Event off the back of his unprecented fourth win in the $50K PPC, and was riding high going into the final table. He spiked an ace on the river with AK vs. KK to put himself in a commanding chip lead, from which he never looked back. Mirzrachi became the first player to win the PPC and Main Event in the same year, taking home a $10,000,000 payday after beating John Wasnock heads up.
2nd Largest WSOP Prize Pool: $93,399,900 in the 2023 Main Event
For years, the World Series of Poker executives wanted to beat the record set by the 2006 Main Event. They’d come close in previous years, but could never quite get over the line. To boost attendance, the WSOP ran satellites online on GGPoker and WSOP.com, and they launched “Main Event Maynia,” which offered step satellites at live casinos around the US and the world.
The result surpassed everyone’s expectations, as the Main Event reached 10,000 players for the first time in its history. 10,043 players signed up for the $10K buy-in event, creating a prize pool of $93,399,900, from which the top 1,506 players received a payout. The final table was notable for its huge pay jumps, including a $5.6 million jump from second to first. After a tense heads-up battle, Dan Weinman handled the pressure and collected $12.1million for his victory.
The Largest Prize Pool in WSOP History: $94,041,600 in the 2024 Main Event
After finally surpassing the 10,000-player barrier in 2023, many people suspected that it would be hard to recreate the feat, given the amount of effort that went into marketing and creating satellites for the event. However, the WSOP proved everyone wrong, putting on the biggest WSOP Main Event of all time.
A total of 10,112 players registered for the event, creating the largest WSOP prize pool in history of $94,041,600, with $10 million to be awarded to the winner, moving away from the top-heavy payouts of the 2023 event. There were multiple storylines to follow through the event, like Kristen Foxen nearly becoming the first female player to reach a modern WSOP final table, and online phenom Niklas Astedt (better known as Lena900), making a run to third place.
After In the end, Jonathan Tamayo overturned a 2.5-1 chip disadvantage to take home the coveted bracelet.
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