Having previously hosted poker festivals everywhere from Uruguay to The Bahamas, Scandinavia and Ireland, PartyPoker’s apparent retirement from the live poker scene in 2024 came as a disappointment to many.
The decision to scale back live events - to zero - appears to have been made in concert with a number of other moves including a reduction in staffing, blogging and other activities designed to keep the brand relevant and visible.
Yet it seems that reports of the death of PartyPoker’s live events were exagerrated. The brand, operated by global gaming company Entain, has announced a return to live poker events with five UK-based stops on the PartyPoker Tour scheduled for 2025.
New events confirmed for April, June and August
The last PartyPoker live event took place in November 2023 in Dublin, Ireland, when the Netherlands’ Michel Molenaar won the €3,500 Main Event for €210,000. Now, over a year later, three of five new stops for 2025 have been confirmed:
- Asper’s Casino in London, UK will provide the platform for the launch of the PartyPoker tour when it returns from April 19-27.
- In Manchester, in the northwest of England, the Manchester235 Casino will host the second PartyPoker tour stop of the year from June 17-22.
- The third stop on the 2025 tour will take place at the Alea Casino in Glasgow, Scotland from August 12-17.
Each of the stops will feature a £500 Main Event, a £150 Mini Main Event and a £1,000 High Roller. Freerolls and online satellites (from £0.20), will be available for each stop on the tour, with PartyPoker committing to sending at least 200 qualifiers to each.
No guaranteed prize pools have been announced so far, though individual event dates for the London leg have been released: the Mini Main Event will run April 19-24, the Main Event from April 24-27, and the High Roller on April 27.
A further two live stops are expected to be announced later in the year, with info announced on the PartyPoker tour landing page.
Is this the first salvo in a PartyPoker bid to reclaim a slice of the booming live poker market? The platform is licensed to operate in New Jersey, Ontario, France and various other regions around the world. While live activity remains restricted to the United Kingdom for now, we hope to see PartyPoker bringing its brand of live poker to more markets soon.
