After Years of Players’ Cries, WSOP Returns to ESPN

WSOP Main Event is Back on Prime-Time TV

The World Series of Poker and Entertainment and Sports Programming Network have entered into a multi-year agreement set to bring back one of the most beloved coverage formats — TV specials — along with the live broadcast familiar to many current viewers.

According to the CEO of the WSOP, Ty Stewart The goal of this partnership is simple — reach as wide an audience as possible, especially those people who are new to or unfamiliar with poker:

This joint goal is well within reach. According to publicly available data, as of the end of 2025, EPSN remains an industry leader in the United States, ranking 7th in television viewing popularity with an average of 790,000 viewers every minute over 365 days in 2025.

Moreover, 2025 was one of the most successful years in the channel’s history, showing steady growth not only in views and viewers, but also in paid subscribers.

At the same time, the WSOP remains the most popular series in the United States and one of the most popular in the world, breaking attendance records almost every year.

How ESPN Will Cover the 2026 WSOP Main Event 

ESPN plans to give the audience a total of about 100 hours of WSOP programming following the schedule:

1. July 2nd — ESPN will begin wall-to-wall broadcasting of Day 1A. Each day will be broadcasted at least 6 hours.
2. July 13th — when the final table is reached, the game will pause.
3. July 14th — August 2nd — ESPN will air special WSOP episodes to “build momentum and introduce the final table competitors to a global audience”.
4. August 3rd — 5th — three-day televised finale airing from 9 pm EST to 12 am EST 

The decision to pause for 20 days was made as a strategic television cliffhanger to build anticipation before the final table.

Good News For Viewers, Bad News for Main Event Finalists

While viewers will have a blast with the return of the classic TV experience, this 20 day hiatus will be inconvenient for those players who manage to reach the final table.

Not every US citizen will be happy to hear that they need to wait 20 days after reaching the most prestigious final table to continue playing. This gap will require people to account for additional travel and accommodation costs if they do not live in the location where the series is taking place, as well as changes to family plans for August.

But for finalists from abroad the situation is even worse. They face a more daunting choice: either extend their stay in the country or leave, return after 20 days — and then leave again. In both cases, this means not only more expenses but also more bureaucratic hassle.

And if you’re thinking, “Who cares about foreigners?” — let us remind you of two things:

1. Firstly, we are talking about the WORLD Series of Poker, not the United States Series of Poker.
2. Secondly, on average, five out of nine WSOP Main Event finalists from (at least) 2021 to 2025 have been from outside the United States:

With this in mind, the question remains: is the risk of a player missing a final table due to this new pause worth the content we’ll ultimately receive? We won’t know the answer until August 2026.