What Happened on Day 7 of the 2026 WSOP Main Event?
There was only one tournament, the $25K, where I had to re-enter. Daniel Negreanu has made it crystal clear that pot-limit Omaha (PLO) is his game right now. Daniel Negreanu reveals why PLO is his game of choice, Josh Arieh’s influence and how he beat Artur Martirosian heads-up for his eighth bracelet. In the end, McKeehen outlasted 673 entries in the $5,300 buy-in to score a top prize of $462,600, which was adjusted during heads-up play.
A year before that, women’s all-time money leader Kristen Foxen placed 13th in the largest main event ever held. Normally, if I was playing eight days in a row of cash game no-limit hold’em, I would be ready to off myself. I’ve made two day fives in the main event, but this is the most by far. I was playing no-limit every day, and then I got into mixed games. Rami Hammoud (41,500,000), Lucas Jumalon (40,800,000), and Evagoras Evagorou (38,200,000) closed strong on day 8 to bolster their hopes of a final table run.
LIVE: 2026 World Series Of Poker From Las Vegas
In December 2023, the Bahamas hosted a WSOP bracelet series for the first time. With essentially every poker game and format to choose from, and buy-ins from $300 up to $250,000, this year’s schedule has something for every player and fan. Those survivors will lock up at least $1 million before returning to Las Vegas on August 3 to play for poker’s most coveted title, the gold bracelet and the $10 million first-place prize. Zhao Liu, who started third in chips, was the final player to fall. Gaston was the only player to finish Saturday with more than 20 million chips, yet his big stack translated into a 36th-place finish. Deeb, meanwhile, continues to treat poker’s biggest tournament like it’s just another day at the office.
As the official live reporting partner, we go all-in on coverage of poker’s most famous tournament, from Day 1 flights to the final river card of the heads-up duel. And this year, with a bit of help from the new WSOP+ app, fans can expect fewer mystery players, fewer misspellings, and (finally!) an end to the reign of “Opponent” in hand histories. This will be the eighth time that a WSOP main event champion has earned an eight-figure payday after coming away with the hardware. The past four main events have set a new standard for the tournament, with the 2023 version breaking a 17-year streak for the 2006 main event (8,773 entries) atop the event’s field-size rankings. Winning the historic 2023 WSOP Main Event, American professional poker player Daniel Weinman took home the record-breaking $12,100,000 top prize and his second career WSOP bracelet. The official home of the WSOP, poker players can find the Poker Hall of Fame within the Horseshoe, just outside of the WSOP Hall of Fame Poker Room.
The biggest buy-in event in WSOP history is the $1,000,000 Big One for One Drop, held in 2012, 2014 and 2018. In 2026, the lowest buy-in event was $300 (The Gladiators of Poker) and the biggest buy-in event was $250,000 (Super High Roller). The World Series of Poker is held ever summer at the Horseshoe and Paris Las Vegas Hotel & Casino. There was also still time for another legend to write himself into the record books. That year saw the first non-American win the Main Event as Mansour Matloubi triumphed, and 1991 saw the first prize reach $1,000,000 for the first time. The start of the 1980s was heralded by back-to-back wins for Stu Ungar and the following year, the field surpassed 100 for the first time.
Don’t forget to mark your calendars for the start of the $10,000 No-Limit Hold’em WSOP Main Event, as airing returns to ESPN from Thursday, July 2 through Monday, July 13, with a special three-day final table finale taking place Monday, August 3 through Wednesday, August 5. Mystery bounties in the $550 Mini Mystery Millions come into play on day two of the event, scheduled for Sunday, May 31, with cards in the air at 1 P.M. While the buy-in may be lower for the Mini Mystery Millions compared to the Mystery Millions, there is still great riches for the poker player lucky enough to win the biggest bounty. Each poker player is permitted 2 re-entries per flight. The surviving finalists will reconvene 20 days later for a live, three-day televised finale airing August 3-5 from 9pm-12am EST. Under the new agreement, poker fans can expect wall-to-wall coverage, with each tournament day receiving a minimum of six hours of programming.
He’s cashed in this event six times before, with his previous best being a third-place finish in 2006, when this event debuted as the $50,000 H.O.R.S.E. championship. The final table is set in the 2026 World Series of Poker $50,000 Poker Players Championship. “It’s a great thing, the French poker community… we are all together all the time. This was by far the largest score yet for Boos, blowing away the $65,364 he earned for a final-table showing in a €380 event at the Italian Poker Sport Rozvadov festival last year. It was a nice time; the tournament was great,” said Boos.
Every summer since 2022, thousands of poker players from all over the world have made the trip to Las Vegas to compete for WSOP bracelets and life-changing money at Horseshoe and Paris. The group of players who reached the final table each year would be dubbed the November Nine, contributing to a significant chapter in WSOP and televised poker history. In an effort to capitalize on popularity and boost viewership, from 2008 to 2016, the WSOP Main Event would play out during the yearly summer series, but would hold the final table of the event four months later in November. A recreational poker player who won his $10,000 buy-in through a $86 online satellite tournament, Moneymaker’s Main Event win inspired people around the world to take up the game of poker both online and live, triggering the Poker Boom of the early 2000’s. Completing one of, if not the greatest career comeback in poker history, Ungar went on to win the 1997 Main Event, joining Johnny Moss as the only two players to win the event 3 times. In the late 1960s, casino magnate Benny Binion aspired to hold an event pitting the best poker players in the world against each other at the poker table.
He saw his stack of 50 million evaporate in the last hour of play. One of the day’s cruelest exits belonged to Kyosuke Nagami. Other notable eliminations before the field reached the final three tables included Ralph Perry, whose ambitious hero call with pocket eights on a board of 10♠6♥5♣4♥Q♥ ended his run in 44th place. Tyler Gaston and Blake Barousse bagged the two biggest stacks at the end of Day 6, but neither made it to the final three tables. “I just realized this tournament ends tomorrow, so I can still hop in the $25K H.O.R.S.E. and the $1K Turbo,” he said. “I thought I was running hot already. I thought I’d used up all my run good for the year, maybe two years. But the poker gods have shined on me again.
ESPN coverage of the 2026 WSOP main event is set to start with day 1a of the tournament, on Thursday, July 2, and run through the entirety of the tournament. The first official day of WSOP tournament action also includes a $5,000 buy-in no-limit hold’em event, which kicks off at 2 p.m. Until ESPN enters the picture later in the summer, final tables and live streams will air in-house on WSOP’s digital platforms, primarily on YouTube, starting on May 29. Once the final nine players are set, chip bags come out, and players are sent on their way for an extended break. While most WSOP events last three days and several take a full week to complete, this turbo tournament was finished in a single session. He is just the ninth player to ever surpass the $60-million mark, and is now ranked ninth on poker’s all-time money list.
Fan favorites, including the Mystery Millions, Millionaire Maker, and the Senior’s Championship, are set to return to the schedule along with some new, exciting tournament formats. Defending champion Junjie He won’t be defending his crown after starting the day with 88,500 and hitting the rail before night’s end. Two of the biggest names in the field to start Wednesday saw their days end surprisingly quickly. 2023 APT Taipei Main Event champion Punnat Punsri will join the Day 3 field from the Natural8 ‘Onlive’ flight with 492,000. Other notables moving on include Bin Duan, whose career-best cash of $351,000 came here in South Korea in a 2025 Triton event. Haohui Ma had an eventful couple of levels, starting with a dramatic double-up when he got his pocket kings in against Tomoya Kojima’s aces and drilled a two-outer on the river.
Like his victory in the 2024 WSOP $50,000 Poker Players Championship, Negreanu won this title while filming his popular WSOP vlog, which features daily coverage of his ups and downs from the series. This was the fourth-largest payday of the Poker Hall of Famer’s career. Hot on the heels of Benny Glaser, Michael Mizrachi, and Shaun Deeb all securing their ninth career bracelets, Daniel Negreanu managed one of the biggest titles of his career to keep pace. Caesars Entertainment, Inc. offers diversified gaming, entertainment and hospitality amenities, one-of-a-kind destinations, and a full suite of mobile and online gaming and sports betting experiences. Reduced room rates are available across Caesars Entertainment’s Las Vegas resorts for the series.
The most recent WSOP Main Event in 2025 drew a field of 9,735, the third-largest turnout in the history of the tournament. Hailing from Barcelona, Spain, Margets is not new to success at the WSOP, having won her lone bracelet in the $1,500 No-Limit Hold’em Closer for $376,850 in 2021. Still seeking his first career WSOP bracelet, Hallaert’s first title won in the United States could be the biggest one of them all. Already having a WSOP bracelet to his name, Dunaway won the $1,500 Monster Stack for $1,162,681 during the 2023 WSOP. Braxton Dunaway (Midland, Texas, United States) – 91,900,000 ChipsBraxton Dunaway, 42, lives in Midland, Texas, and is a family man who makes his living in the oil and gas industry.
WSOP Main Event Champions 1970-2025
For players in Nevada, New Jersey, Michigan, and Pennsylvania, WSOP Online has become something worth paying attention to. This app is the essential tool for player wanting to take advantage of the full event experience Playing online poker should always be fun. If “poker winnings” isn’t enough to satisfy Nevada operators, the Las Vegas poker landscape could face hard times in the future. On the other hand, it could create huge hurdles for people to play high-stakes poker in Sin City.
Shaun Deeb is the reigning WSOP Player of the Year, having cashed in 18 live events, six online bracelet events, and reached five final tables in 2025. From the smallest fields to the largest, the $1,500 Monster Stack and $500 Colossus, will once again draw enormous crowds, as players of all levels embark on their annual poker pilgrimage to play two of the summer’s most popular events. With a $5,000 pricetag, the event is sure to draw some of poker’s best full-time professional players who look to secure a big score and add a shiny, new WSOP gold bracelet to their wrist. Elsewhere at the SHRPO series, statistical anomalies were on tap as three different players won four events in the series. The most prestigious mixed-game poker tournament of the year is down to its final six contenders, and the remaining half dozen players include some of the most decorated names in the game.
- Extending his WSOP bracelet victory total to 4, Scott Clements showcased his mixed game mastery by claiming victory in the $10,000 Omaha Hi-Lo 8 or Better Championship.
- It was a tough final level for Mueller on day 7, but he has 22 big blinds to start day 8.
- The day belonged to Sasha Liu, however, who bagged a big chip lead when she ended Day 3 on 2,364,000 chips, some way clear of second-placed Martin Zamani (1,963,000), with Levon Khachatryan (1,745,000), Robert Gill (1,604,000) and Zdenek Zizka (1,576,000) rounding out the top five.
Stay tuned to PokerNews all summer long for exclusive coverage from inside the ropes at the 2025 World Series of Poker. The Poker Hall pokernewsdaily.com of Fame isn’t the only focus of the summer. There’s a new owner, but the prestige and thrill of chasing bracelets remains the same.
I think this was a time where there was a very narrow idea of what women in poker could really do. I always thought it was an advantage to be a woman in the tournament reporting space because poker tournaments are very boring and these guys are stuck in their seats and just want someone to talk to. But, as someone who walked by the media room a half dozen times this summer and never saw a soul inside it, I doubt people would grasp just how many people were in there. So, by the end of my first summer, I picked up an extra gig working for the WPT as a tournament reporter for Bellagio Cup. On my first day I remember the time for the first post was drawing near and I just sat at the computer afraid I would mess it up.
What was once a sea of 9,208 entries is down to just three tables going into day 8, and by the close of play on Monday, July 13, the final nine will claim their place in poker history. More than 68 percent of the players who reached day 5 fell by the end of the night. For almost any other player, even a hint of repeating as WSOP main event champion would be an absurdity. Other players to keep an eye on heading into day 6 include Patrick Leonard, Loren Klein, Sean Winter, Lara Eisenberg, Dylan Smith, Caitlin Comeskey, Matt Salsberg, Brock Wilson, and Zdenek Zizka.
Starting the day with over three-quarters of the chips in play, Mizrachi made quick work of the competition, eliminating fourth-place finisher Kenny Hallaert ($3,000,000) and third-place finisher Braxton Dunaway ($4,000,000) during the first two hands of the day. Here’s a look at the broadcast schedule for the 2026 final table. The WSOP portfolio of events includes approximately 40 WSOP Circuit Events annually across five continents, WSOP Europe (since 2007), WSOP Paradise (since 2023) and the record-breaking WSOP Online festival. In 2025, the flagship event in Las Vegas attracted 246,960 entrants and awarded more than $481 million in prize money – setting all-time records for the second consecutive year. More information on individual WSOP events, including schedules and structure sheets, can be found at
A classic poker game that does not involve a flop and is often played as a limit game. Omaha poker is an action game often played as a pot-limit or fixed-limit game Ten levels are scheduled or playing down to 48 players. Among other things, visitors will find a daily dose of articles with the latest poker news, live reporting from tournaments, exclusive videos, podcasts, reviews and bonuses and so much more.
This year’s Player of the Year race will award $1 million in prizes across the 100 best-performing players, including a $100,000 WSOP Paradise package for the eventual champion. The 100 bracelet-awarding events that make up the 2026 WSOP will play a significant role in the race for the revamped WSOP Player of the Year competition. Coming from a sports journalism background, Platt told PokerNews last month that fans can expect a “new era” of broadcasts, showcasing “more tournaments, more players, and more storylines.” Alongside the new events, the way fans watch this summer’s WSOP is set for a major shake-up, with a free daily livestream available to an international audience on the WSOP’s YouTube channel. Scheduled to run between July 14-25, during the final days of the WSOP bracelet series, the WSOP Circuit Las Vegas schedule features a $400 Mini Main Event, a $2,200 No-Limit High Roller, and a $1,700 No-Limit Hold’em Main Event.
Along the way, she helped turn live updates, podcasts, video, and streaming into something more than a scoreboard and and learned what gets lost when everybody is forced to consume poker the same way. The six-time bracelet winner got all in with a pair of tens facing eights and deuces on fifth street. The two-time bracelet winner has cashed twice, though, placing 13th and 14th in 2023 and 2024, respectively. The chip leader is eight-time bracelet winner Benny Glaser, who added three wins to his tally in 2025.
Glaser has also come close to winning this event before, finishing fourth in 2022. Ivey has more than $54.9 million in prior earnings and has locked up at least $226,172 by making it down to the final six from a field of 108 entries in this year’s PPC. The champion will add theirs to the Chip Reese Memorial trophy, in addition to earning a WSOP bracelet and the top prize of $1,343,764. The day 10 broadcast kicks off on ESPN at 8 p.m. Action resumes on Tuesday, Aug. 4, at approximately 4 p.m.
Saaskilahti became the second player to hit the 100-million mark when he pulled off a big bluff with queen high. I just prepared a little bit, like psychologically,” he said when asked about the three-week layoff from when the final table was set back on July 13th. Jumalon continued to fall from his early high water mark when his preflop raising war with Saaskilahti ended the Finnish player five-betting A♣K♠. Neither player improved on the end and Jumalon opted not to continue bluffing with six high. After taking down that pot, he chipped up to 214,000,000, or just shy of 3,567 times the initial starting stack of 60,000 for this championship event. Bruce Buffer, the famous voice of mixed martial arts and a poker tournament regular, kicked off the proceedings with his signature catchphrase.
Maxwell Franklin rebounded from less than one big blind to make the final table, while Nick Yunis surged from three big blinds to the chip lead by the time the unofficial final table was reached. In the meantime, Nakai cracked aces and ace-king with king-seven in a three-way all-in to triple up, though he remained well behind chip leaders Wong and Jongwook Lee when play reached the final two tables. More players quickly hit the rail after the restart, including Trung Le (78th), the only casualty of a three-way all-in.