With 2025 nearly in the rearview, it’s a good opportunity to look back on some of the most eye-watering pots of the year – the ones that broke records, brains, and bankrolls.
If you watched any of the coverage of Ossi ‘Monarch’ Ketola and the series of heads-up matches he fought through, you’ll know that several of the pots on this list come from those showdowns. When you’re competing at nosebleed stakes with several million dollars on the table, the monster pots are bound to happen sooner or later. And they did.
With that being said, Ketola wasn't the only player dabbling in seven-figure pots this year – so check out the list below to learn all about the biggest pots of 2025.
Keating’s $1.6M hero call
Alan Keating has several budding rivalries in the high stakes cash game world – one of which is with Nik ‘Airball’ Arcot as his counterpart.
So, when the two clashed during the Hustler Casino Live Million Dollar Game back in May of 2025, neither held back, and the result was this $1.6M pot that saw Keating dig deep to find a hero call.
The $12.7M standard
Ketola took on a number of opponents over the course of his heads-up matches – some faring better than others. One of these opponents, Bjorn ‘asianflushie’ Li, took a substantial loss against the Finn and ended up on the wrong side of the largest-ever televised pot. After having Ketola on the ropes for much of the match, Li sent more than one double up to his opponent and their stacks evened out.
With frustration rising, Li desperately wanted to find a way to stop the bleeding. Instead, he walked right into a pair-over-pair confrontation that left him drawing to just two outs with $12,700,000 in the pot.
The biggest pot in High Stakes Poker history
Peter Wang, a Chinese recreational player who regularly plays on Hustler Casino Live, is another of Keating's budding rivals. The two have clashed not only in Los Angeles on the livestream set, but also at the PokerGO Studio in Las Vegas during a run of High Stakes Poker episodes. With history between the two playing a role, they tangled in a $1.4M pot – and Keating had the best of it.
In the video below, you can hear from Keating himself as he breaks down how he won the biggest pot in the history of High Stakes Poker.
Alex Foxen's $11M flush out
Alex Foxen took his shot at Ketola in a series of escalating buy-in matches, culminating in three $6M apiece battles. Foxen won the first of these matches, adding to his profit lead. Ketola fought back in the second, though, and it all came down to the third match. Within minutes, the deciding pot arrived – and, with it, a record that didn't last.
Foxen had the best of it headed into the river, but the poker gods saw fit to bail out Ketola with a full house at the last gasp. With so much already invested, Foxen couldn't find the fold and a record-breaking $10,990,000 changed hands – though that record didn't stand for very long.
'Jungleman' coolered and slow-rolled
In the first of Ketola's must-see heads-up matches, he took on Daniel 'Jungleman' Cates at the Merit Onyx Club. While the stakes hadn't yet reached their zenith, the action was fierce as the two battled for hours on end.
In one of the most interesting pots of the clash, Ketola opted to raise massively with a weak king-high. The aggression was well-timed, however, as he proceeded to flop quads as Cates improved to a full house on the turn and then rivered an even higher full house. When the chips went in – all $2.8M of them – Ketola took his time in rolling over the winner, understandably frustrating Cates.
