Irish Poker Open 2025 – All You Need to Know
A record number of players are expected to visit Dublin to participate in the 2025 Irish Poker Open.
Finland’s Tero Laurila celebrates his 2024 Irish Open victory. © PokerStars/ Danny Maxwell
Key Facts:
- Twelve days of Irish Open poker action will begin on April 10.
- Tournament entry fees range from €120 to €9,750, plus varying registration fees.
- Irish Open Main Event comes with a €2.5 million guarantee.
- RTE television recently unearthed extraordinary footage of the 1982 Irish Open.
The 45th edition of the Irish Poker Open will begin on Thursday, April 10. This year, the longest-running poker tournament outside of America’s World Series of Poker will be supported by an additional 68 competitions, all played inside the Royal Dublin Society – Ireland’s largest exhibition and conference centre.
Tournament entry fees range between €120 and €9,750. The showpiece Irish Open costs €1,000 to play. Last year, a ‘tip before you win’ 2.5% “staff gratuity” scheme meant €25 of that sum never made it to the prize pool, and, once again, 2025’s Main Event demands a €150 registration fee.
Online Qualifiers Means €2.5 Million Guarantee Is Safe
In 2024, Finland’s Tero Laurila collected €292,685, outlasting a rival 3,233 entries comprising of an estimated 1,400 players, including 800 online qualifiers. Ultimately, the decades-old tournament created a €3,152,175 prize pool.
This year, organisers, who collected one of the 38 awards bestowed at this year’s Global Poker Awards – for ‘Best Stand-Alone Festival’ – have put a €2.5 million guarantee on the Irish Open Main Event.
With satellite competitions running on some of the UK’s best online poker sites, including 23 that are part of the iPoker network, seemingly only an Icelandic volcano ash cloud could prevent enough poker players from making their way to Dublin to thwart the guarantee.
Irish Open Roller Coaster Prize Money Ride
The Irish Open rode the early 2000s poker boom well, and the competition’s entry fee rose year-on-year between 2002 and 2008, increasing from €770 to €4,500. The competition flattened out in 2015 when just 321 players paid the €3,500 entry to play.
However, a dramatic entry fee drop to €1,150 in 2016 has seen the competition enjoy increasing entry numbers every year since. Entry and player numbers should not be confused, as the former freezeout competition now allows rebuys. Recent figures show that, on average, players take over two entries.
It is all a far cry from the early years of the Irish Open. The inaugural 1980 edition was won by Colette Doherty, the first European female player to take a seat in the World Series of Poker Main Event. Doherty, who passed away in February 2025, also won the Irish Open in 1991.
Some of America’s finest poker players – including Stu Ungar – in action in Dublin, Ireland. pic.twitter.com/Pgy6pJ6xv3
— Sports & Betting History by BestBettingSites (@CDCHistory) March 5, 2025
Early Irish Open’s had an £2,000 entry fee – a sum well over €10,000 in today’s money – attracting around two dozen players, including the cream of the American playing crop. Amarillo’ Slim’ Preston, Doyle’ Texas Dolly’ Brunson and Stu ‘The Kid’ Unger played in the competition more than once.
Irish state broadcaster RTE recently posted some extraordinary footage of the 1982 Irish Open. Highlights of the 1983 event, including a rare interview with Stu ‘The Kid’ Unger, can also be found on RTE’s website.
Big Money and Fun Tournaments
High-stakes players are well-catered for at the 2025 Irish Poker Open Festival. In the Hold’em category, there are two €5,000 High Roller events and a €10,000 entry, €500,000 guaranteed, Super High Roller tournament. Omaha players have a €5,000 PLO High Roller and €5k PLO High Roller Mystery Bounty to choose from.
There is a broad cross-section of tournaments complimenting the Irish Open. These include the €200 entry Irish Open Deaf Championships, the €250 Ladies Championship, and the JP Poker Masters (named in honour of the Irish Open’s joint organiser, JP McCann), which cost €500 to play.
With a €50 registration fee and only a single re-entry allowed, shrewd players will recognise this tournament offers far better value than the feature contest. The JP Poker Masters starts on April 19, day 10 of the 12-day poker feast.
Where to Stay While You Play
The Irish Open, run in collaboration with PokerStars and Paddy Power, recommends the Maldron Hotel Merrion Road, two kilometres from the RDS, for players seeking accommodation. It has an “exclusive discount deal” with the hotel for people staying three nights or more using the promo code: Poker25.
The Maldron’s website currently quotes a ‘room only’ rate for a single person without breakfast of €419 for two nights over an Irish Poker Open weekend. Concurrently, the Clayton Hotel – a convenient six-minute walk from the RDS – is asking €548 for the same single-person room-only deal.
