A record number of participants played at WSOP 2026
July 18, 2026
The main portion of the 2026 World Series of Poker has wrapped up, and all that's left is to wait for the Main Event final table, which will take place in early August. In the meantime, let's take a look at the stats from the festival in Las Vegas.
WSOP 2026 set a record for the number of participants. A total of 251,899 people played across 100 tournaments. That said, the prize money fell short of last year's record, coming in at $469.9 million. In 2025, players collected a combined $481 million. Tournament fees totaled $47.3 million, of which $33.1 million stayed with WSOP, while $14.2 million was paid out to dealers and staff.
Recreational events continued to grow as well. Monster Stack, Mini Main Event and Ultra Stack drew more participants than last year. And Mystery Millions, which gathered 22,811 entries, became the largest live tournament with a $1,000 buy-in in history. A similar record among PLO events was set by the $1000 Mystery Bounty Pot-Limit Omaha, which had 4,764 people play in it.
The rest of the WSOP 2026 stats:
🟡 149 countries represented;
🟣 35,157 prize payouts made;
🟡 41 prizes exceeded $1,000,000;
🟣 57 tournaments with a prize pool over $2,000,000;
🟡 8 tournaments with a prize pool over $10,000,000;
🟣 7 tournaments drew more than 10,000 participants (in 2025 there were five).
Since the founding of the World Series in 1970, 2,049 bracelets have been awarded, nearly 2.6 million people have taken part in live events, and prize money has exceeded $5.6 billion. Notably, the last five festivals accounted for 37.5% of all prize money ($2.1 billion) and 42.3% of all participants (1.1 million people) in WSOP history.
WSOP 2026 set a record for the number of participants. A total of 251,899 people played across 100 tournaments. That said, the prize money fell short of last year's record, coming in at $469.9 million. In 2025, players collected a combined $481 million. Tournament fees totaled $47.3 million, of which $33.1 million stayed with WSOP, while $14.2 million was paid out to dealers and staff.
Recreational events continued to grow as well. Monster Stack, Mini Main Event and Ultra Stack drew more participants than last year. And Mystery Millions, which gathered 22,811 entries, became the largest live tournament with a $1,000 buy-in in history. A similar record among PLO events was set by the $1000 Mystery Bounty Pot-Limit Omaha, which had 4,764 people play in it.
The rest of the WSOP 2026 stats:
🟡 149 countries represented;
🟣 35,157 prize payouts made;
🟡 41 prizes exceeded $1,000,000;
🟣 57 tournaments with a prize pool over $2,000,000;
🟡 8 tournaments with a prize pool over $10,000,000;
🟣 7 tournaments drew more than 10,000 participants (in 2025 there were five).
Since the founding of the World Series in 1970, 2,049 bracelets have been awarded, nearly 2.6 million people have taken part in live events, and prize money has exceeded $5.6 billion. Notably, the last five festivals accounted for 37.5% of all prize money ($2.1 billion) and 42.3% of all participants (1.1 million people) in WSOP history.
