SCOOP 2026 Swaps Seasons: PokerStars Moves up Spring Series

SCOOP 2026 Swaps Seasons: PokerStars Moves up Spring Series
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Iva Dozet News Editor
Fact Checked: PokerListings
  • Updated: December 4, 2025
  • Read time: 1 min

This week, PokerStars decided that May’s no longer the ideal home for its Spring Championship of Online Poker. For 2026, SCOOP will run two months earlier from March 1 to 25, which is going to make for a very different start to the poker year.

Since this news just came out, we don’t have a lot of details yet but here’s what we do know.

Why This 2026 Change?

According to PokerStars, this is just about practicality. Moving SCOOP 2026 to March means there’s going to be fewer clashes with major events, fewer outdoor distractions, and, depending on where you live, weather that encourages staying indoors with a laptop. In other words, a month that behaves more like “online poker season” than May’s been in recent years.

In their announcement, PokerStars said the shift’s part of a larger effort to streamline its annual calendar and place major series where they make the most sense. And as far as SCOOP itself goes, it gets to keep its structure: the familiar three-tier buy-in system, the headline events, and the long-running format that’ve defined the festival since 2009.

As for everything else that has to do with the 2026 edition, including the schedule, that’s still TBA.

A Little Look Back at SCOOP 2025

2025 left the series on solid footing. Simon “C. Darwin2” Mattsson added five more titles to reach a career total of 14, while Brazil set a new record with 101 series wins.

Parker “Tonkaaaa” Talbot
Parker “Tonkaaaa” Talbot

PokerStars ambassadors made their mark as well: Parker “tonkaaaa” Talbot picked up two trophies, and Sebastian “peace&loove” Huber earned his first. Overall, it was a good reminder of why SCOOP remains one of the key fixtures on our online poker calendars.