Poker Stars

About Poker Stars

Launched in 2001, PokerStars is a prominent online brand, controlling more than two-thirds of the web-based market for the game. It’s licensed in the Isle of Man and Malta, as well as operating under the licences of various European governments.

On average, around 15,000 participants play real-money cash games with this operator every day.
Games offered include, among others, Texas Hold’em, Omaha and Stud variants, Courchevel and Zoom Poker, a fast-fold ring format where opponents swap after each hand.

There are also ‘mixed games’ which rotate through a number of the titles mentioned above.

In 2012, the company bought up its former competitor, Full Tilt Poker in a $731m deal. In June 2014, PokerStars was itself bought, for nearly $5bn, by The Stars Group, formerly Amaya. This saw rake fees in cash game and tournaments rise for players.

Since spring 2016, it has offered desktop and mobile games to NetEnt’s poker lobby in New Jersey plus other locations.

Popular Poker Stars Tournaments

• The Sunday Million is the largest weekly online poker tournament, with a guaranteed $1m prize fund, plus a $215 buy-in. It broke records back in March 2011, with nearly 60,000 participants creating a prize pool worth a total of $11,825,600.
• World Championship of Online Poker, which has run since 2002, pays out the web-based game’s highest prizes.
• Spring Championship of Online Poker, launched in 2009, is the world’s most popular online tournament series, with three different buy-in stakes.
• Micro Millions, launched in March 2012, is aimed at low-stakes and recreational players, offering attractive guaranteed cash prizes

Reap the rewards

PokerStars revamped its Star Rewards scheme in the spring of 2019. Players earn points which allow them to open chests containing cash prizes. There are six different levels of the chest, each containing between 50 cents and $700.

Under the changes, prizes grew bigger, but it became harder to reach the six currently available levels (of which black is the highest.)

PokerStars’ traffic and tournament prize funds dominate the competition. And the site is better equipped to offer other kinds of promos than its smaller competitors, making it a force in the game that can’t be ignored.