Although the World Series of Poker has been around for nearly 60 years, it didn’t hit mainstream popularity until around 2003, with the WSOP Main Event victory of Chris Moneymaker.
His win sparked interest due to a belief rooted in a sense of accessibility. If Chris Moneymaker could turn a modest bankroll into millions of dollars, so could anyone else.
Fast forward to 2025, and the World Series of Poker’s popularity has taken off. Where Moneymaker earned $2.5 million for his victory in 2003, the winner of this year’s Main Event took home a cool $10 million. Everyone at the final table, in fact, earned at least $1.1 million for their efforts.
Still, the World Series of Poker’s impact is perhaps most evident in the online poker sector. More people are becoming active participants. Additionally, more online sites offer poker as a primary form of play.
Where it was once reserved for online casinos, you will see, as one example, a detailed review of BetUS sportsbook highlighting its poker opportunities just as much as its live-sports gambling lines.
Not surprisingly, the online poker industry has experienced a meteoric uptick in revenue and handle since Moneymaker’s famed 2003 victory at the World Series of Poker. But just how much money is at stake? The number may deliver a 12-figure surprise.
Online Poker Market Expected to Flirt with $200 Billion Cap Very Soon
Exact figures are difficult to determine because the online poker industry remains highly decentralized. But recent projections suggest online poker will have a market cap of almost $200 billion within the next 10 years.
More specifically, the market cap for online poker is expected to reach $183.3 billion by 2034, according to Prophecy Market Insights (via Yahoo Finance). For comparison’s sake, the online poker market size and share checked in around $54 billion for the 2024 calendar year. The latest projections represent a 340 percent increase.
This level of growth may seem impossible at first glance. And look, the numbers we’re dealing with here are massive. But when you annualize the growth, it comes to less than 15 percent year over year.
Make no mistake: an entire market segment mushrooming by 10-plus percent on average over each 12-month period is absurd. But it is not unprecedented.
The World Series of Poker is Playing an Active Hand in the Online Takeover
At a time when everyone favors remote activities and convenience, it can be easy to dismiss the World Series of Poker’s cultural and financial impact on the sports as outmoded. Do not fall for that trap.
For starters, the WSOP has adapted to the times. They run online tournaments and even award online bracelets.
What’s more, the in-person Main Event continues to have staying power, with attendance up nearly 30 percent. That is not a sport or tradition on life support.
If anything, the World Series of Poker continues to harvest a new generation of fans—and players. And the groundwork they laid decades ago has paved the way for how people both consume and participate in it.
As Nenad Nikolic over at High Stake DB writes, the way in which the World Series of Poker disseminated and handled its broadcast over the years actually helped pave the way for the spirit of live streaming:
“The journey of poker livestreaming has its roots in the early broadcasts of the World Series of Poker (WSOP) in the late 1970s and 1980s.
The innovation of hole-card cameras under glass-topped tables changed everything. The British TV show Late Night Poker, which aired in 1999, was among the first to use under-the-table cameras, allowing audiences to see players’ hidden cards.
The World Series of Poker and High Stakes Poker started using hole-card cameras in the table’s rail in the early 2000s. These shows brought poker into millions of homes, igniting the ‘Poker Boom’ after amateur player Chris Moneymaker won the WSOP Main Event in 2003.”
No matter how you care to frame it, you cannot tell the story of online poker without acknowledging the impact the WSOP has had on it. And the online poker industry most certainly would not be headed for a 12-figure market cap if not for the groundwork that was laid, and continues to be laid, by the World Series of Poker.
