WPT First-Half Schedule Looking Like Most Robust Since at Least 2021

The World Poker Tour schedule for 2026 is shaping up as the tour’s most robust in years, possibly since the pre-COVID days.

Last week, the WPT dropped a press release detailing some of its early 2026 events. The release announced the return of WPT Venetian and WPT Rolling Thunder. Along with WPT Lucky Hearts Poker Open and WPT Cambodia, that makes four main tour events with buy-ins of at least $3,500 on the schedule through the end of March.

One has to go back to 2021 to find a comparable schedule for the WPT in that time frame.

Four Main Tour Events a High-Water Mark for WPT Since 2021

Here’s a look at how the WPT’s live first-half schedules have shaped up through March over the past few years:

Note that WPT Rolling Thunder did take place in 2023, but it started on April 1.

The early schedules were mostly rather sparse in each of 2022-2025. Last year, WPT Venetian took place during the summer to coincide with the World Series of Poker and take advantage of the influx of Vegas players.

WPT LHPO in Florida is returning to the WPT schedule for the first time since 2022.

That particular event signifies the on-again, off-again relationship the WPT has had with some of its partner properties for certain events. In reality, the LHPO took place in each of those intervening years. However, it didn’t have the WPT branding.

The WPT has had a similar relationship with other events at times, such as the recently concluded WPT Bay 101 Shooting Star Championship. WPT Bay 101 returned to the schedule after several years on ice, but it had last run as an unaffiliated tournament in 2020.

Does Active Early Schedule Foreshadow Big 2026?

WPT committing to getting some of these well-known events back into the fold may provide a signal that the full 2026 schedule will be its biggest and best in years.

Having 11 live main tour events each of the past couple of years already counted as a boost after the nadir of 2023, which only had eight.

In the salad days of 2007-2016, the WPT crowned upwards of 20 champions per year. Some calendar years featured even more, as many as 23 main tour events.

WPT pushed past 20 as recently as 2019. And 2020 was heading that way, with eight events through March, before COVID changed the landscape of tournament poker. The WPT’s schedule has never looked remotely the same since.

The sparse 2023 early schedule wound up hinting at the lack of overall events. So will the opposite case for early 2026 indicate a fuller overall schedule? That remains to be seen until the WPT announces more events.

It’s probably a safe bet that stuff like WPT Choctaw and WPT bestbet Scramble will return. These have been staples of the yearly WPT grind. The key will be keeping Bay 101 and other recently returned events in the fold, as well as continuing the commitment to a robust international schedule with stuff like WPT Australia.

Image credit: WPT/Flickr (license)