WSOP 2022 Final Numbers: Was It a Successful Series?
3 minutes
Last Updated: February 2, 2023
The first World Series of Poker to take place on the Las Vegas Strip is in the books. When the new WSOP venue was originally announced, there were many expectations as to what it could mean for the Series.
Most of these were positive, as the poker public expected the move to Paris and Bally’s would help bring in more players.
And overall, these predictions were correct. The 2022 WSOP was one of the biggest events thus far across the board.
In this article, we’ll take a closer look into some specific numbers, though, to see how exactly the WSOP did this summer and figure out what these numbers are telling us about the state of poker.
The Second Biggest Main Event in History
The biggest highlight of any World Series of Poker is, of course, the Main Event. It is one tournament that everyone wants to play, as the title comes with a big prestige and a massive monetary amount.
Prior to the start, there were speculations that this could be the biggest Main Event ever, finally taking down the record long-held by the 2006 tournament.
It wasn’t clear whether this prediction would come true until the very end of the registration at the start of Day 2.
But it was pretty obvious it would be a close call.
When the dust settled, the tournament clock was showing 8,663 players, which wasn’t enough to break the record (8,773 players in 2006) but was enough to make the 2022 Main Event the second-biggest in history of the competition.
The final prize pool grew to just shy of $81 million, and 1,300 players made the money. The tournament awarded eight seven-figure prizes.
Espen Jorstad made history himself, becoming the first player from Norway to claim the coveted title and pocketing $10,000,000 for his stellar run.
101 WSOP Bracelets Awarded
The total number of WSOP bracelet winners was 101. Of these, 88 were awarded in traditional, live tournaments, while 13 of them found new owners at the virtual felt.
According to the data gathered by pokerfuse, the total prize pool of the 2022 WSOP ended up over $345,000,000 – for the first time ever.
A total of 25 players won $1,000,000 or more, and the average prize pool of a 2022 WSOP event was $3.5 million.
Just looking at the numbers, it is easy to discern that the just-finished World Series of Poker was a big success, and it met and exceeded many of the early expectations and speculations.
Something New & Something Old
Expecting a big turnout, the World Series brought back some of its most popular events but also introduced some new ones to the schedule.
Among some of the all-time favorites to make an appearance were:
- $1,500 Monster Stack – 6,501 entries & $8.7 million prize pool ($966,577 for the winner)
- $1,500 Millionaire Maker – 7.961 entries & $10.6 million prize pool ($1,125,189 for the winner)
- $400 Colossus – 13,565 entries & $4.5 million prize pool ($414,490 for the winner)
One fresh addition to the WSOP schedule that generated a lot of buzz was the first-ever $1,000 Million Dollar Bounty event.
The tournament featured a very interesting structure, offering mystery bounty payouts starting from Day 2, ranging between $25,000 and a cool million.
Not surprisingly, the event drew in a massive field of 14,112 entries, and it was one of the more energetic events of the Series, so we can fully expect to see it back on the docket in the years to come.
In terms of the number of entries, the record was set by the $500 Housewarming Event that took place early on in the Series.
The tournament gathered 20,080 entries and generated a massive prize pool of almost $8.5 million. Henry Acain was the last man standing, pocketing $701,215 and his very first WSOP bracelet.
Was 2022 WSOP a Success?
No matter how you look at it, this year’s World Series of Poker was a resounding success. By many metrics, it was the largest WSOP ever, even if it failed to produce the biggest Main Event field.
We saw the biggest number of bracelet-awarding events and the largest overall prize pool in WSOP history, both of which are impressive stats.
This success can partially be attributed to the new venue, as WSOP’s presence on the Las Vegas Strip certainly helped boost the player numbers at least somewhat.
But, there is an even more important conclusion to be drawn here.
Poker seems just as popular today as it was over a decade ago when the famous poker boom happened. Some things may have changed over the years, but the love for the game remains, and there are still many players eager to get involved with the world’s biggest poker competition!
