List of largest poker tournaments in history (by prize pool)

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 has 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, the 14 largest prize pools in history have been WSOP Main Events. The 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 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]
2018 WSOP Main Event	$74,015,600	John Cynn	$8,800,000	[6]
2010 WSOP Main Event	$68,799,059	Jonathan Duhamel	$8,944,310	[7]
2017 WSOP Main Event	$67,877,400	Scott Blumstein	$8,150,000	[8]
2011 WSOP Main Event	$64,531,000	Pius Heinz	$8,711,956	[9]
2008 WSOP Main Event	$64,333,600	Peter Eastgate	$9,152,416	[10]
2016 WSOP Main Event	$63,327,800	Qui Nguyen	$8,005,310	[11]
2014 WSOP Main Event	$62,820,200	Martin Jacobson	$10,000,000	[12]
2012 WSOP Main Event	$62,021,200	Greg Merson	$8,527,982	[13]
2009 WSOP Main Event	$61,043,600	Joe Cada	$8,547,042	[14]
2015 WSOP Main Event	$60,348,000	Joe McKeehen	$7,680,021	[15]
2007 WSOP Main Event	$59,784,954	Jerry Yang	$8,250,000	[16]
2013 WSOP Main Event	$59,708,800	Ryan Riess	$8,359,531	[17]
2005 WSOP Main Event	$52,818,610	Joe Hachem	$7,500,000	[18]
2012 WSOP Event 55 – The Big One for One Drop	$42,666,672	Antonio Esfandiari	$18,346,673	[19]
2014 WSOP Event 57 – The Big One for One Drop	$37,333,338	Dan Colman	$15,306,668	[20]
2016 Monte-Carlo One Drop Extravaganza	$27,437,564	Elton Tsang	$12,248,912	[21]
2018 WSOP Event 78 – The Big One for One Drop	$24,840,000	Justin Bonomo	$10,000,000	[22]
2004 WSOP Main Event	$24,224,400	Greg Raymer	$5,000,000	[23]
2012 Macau High Stakes Challenge Super High Roller	$23,511,128	Stanley Choi	$6,465,560	[24]
Super High Roller Bowl 2015	$21,500,000	Brian Rast	$7,525,000	[25]
2016 WSOP Event 67 – High Roller for One Drop	$19,316,565	Fedor Holz	$4,981,775	[26]
2013 WSOP Event 47 – One Drop High Roller	$17,891,148	Anthony Gregg	$4,830,619	[27]
Super High Roller Bowl 2017	$16,800,000	Christoph Vogelsang	$6,000,000	[28]
2007 WPT Championship	$15,495,750	Carlos Mortensen	$3,970,415	[29]
2013 GuangDong Ltd Asia Millions Main Event	$15,376,897	Niklas Heinecker	$4,456,885	[30]
2011 Pokerstars Caribbean Adventure	$15,132,000	Galen Hall	$2,300,000	[31]
Super High Roller Bowl 2016	$15,000,000	Rainer Kempe	$5,000,000	[32]
2010 Pokerstars Caribbean Adventure	$14,831,300	Harrison Gimbel	$2,200,000	[33]
2006 WPT Championship	$14,671,250	Joe Bartholdi, Jr.	$3,760,165	[34]

Notes