If you fancy a proper live poker festival on your doorstep, 888poker LIVE rolls into the capital from the eighth through to the 18th of October. It is being billed as the season-ending stop of the operator’s 2026 European Tour, after earlier festivals took place in Madrid, Glasgow and Barcelona. The venue, as ever for London’s bigger poker gatherings, is the Grosvenor Victoria Casino on Edgware Road, which is better known to most punters simply as ‘the Vic’.
That is 11 days of poker, with 888poker having packed out the schedule with enough side events and satellites that there is, as you’d expect, plenty of ways to get a seat without having to commit to the headline event. Whether you are chasing the big one or just fancy a flutter on one of the cheaper side games, there is plenty here to choose from.
The Main Event
The £1,250 Main Event carries a £250,000 guaranteed drop prize, with the event itself running across three starting flights. Day 1A gets underway on Thursday, the 15th of October at 1pm, whilst Day 1B starts on Friday at noon and a turbo Day 1C kicks off that evening at 8pm. Everyone left standing will then reconvene for Day 2 on the Saturday and, all being well, it should finish on Sunday, the 18th. Players start with 30,000 chips, levels run for 40 minutes for most of the tournament before shifting to 60 minutes on the final day. There is also a 30-second shot clock that kicks in from Day 2 onwards to keep things moving.
Last year’s edition attracted 367 entries and built a prize pool of £383,500, which comfortably beat the guaranteed amount, with Gang Wang taking home £86,600 for the win. Whether this year’s field matches, or even beats, that will not be clear until the flights are done, but the increased guarantee suggests that 888poker are banking on a bigger turnout.
Building Up to the Main Event
The festival of poker opens with the Crazy 8 series on the eighth of October, which is a £500 buy-in event with a £100,000 guaranteed prize spread across five starting flights. That is well worth a look for anyone who is wanting to ease into the week without risking too much of their capital too soon. From there, it is on to the Mini Main, which is a £340 event that also carries a £100,000 guarantee, running from the 11th to the 13th of October.
The High Roller has had its buy-in bumped up this year, seeing it shift from £1,650 to £2,000. The £100,000 guarantee stays put, however, with that event running across the 14th and 15th of October. Elsewhere on the schedule, there is the Big Shot on the 13th, which has a £550 buy-in and a £30,000 guaranteed prize. If that’s not for you, perhaps the Dragon, running across the 17th and 18th with a £550 buy-in and a £50,000 guaranteed prize, will be. Alternatively, a new £250 Turbo Dash carries a £20,000 guaranteed prize.
For those of you that are more philanthropic when it comes to your betting, you might want to consider entering the £220 MND Charity Event, which sees registration fees going straight to charity. Between them, the seven guaranteed events on the schedule add up to £650,000 in prize money, which is a touch down on last year’s £680,000. Interestingly, the Turbo Dash event effectively replaces what had been a Mystery Bounty event back in 2025.
Getting Yourself a Seat
For anyone not fancying the full buy-in upfront, 888poker are running online satellites into the Main Event. The qualifiers here start at only a few cents, building in stages towards $109 qualifiers that award $2,500 packages, covering the £1,250 buy-in itself along with $500 towards accommodation and $300 towards travel. Cash Out satellites also run throughout the live festival at the Vic, which are ideal for those who would rather take their chances closer to home.
Whether 888poker LIVE London becomes a fixture in the future that is worth building a trip around will almost certainly depend on how this edition goes, but as the closing stop of a European tour that will have already taken in Madrid, Glasgow and Barcelona, it is a fair bet that the Vic will be busy for the best part of a fortnight this October.