Who Has Won the WSOP Main Event? Winners by Year

Last Updated on July 7, 2026 by author

The World Series of Poker (WSOP) Main Event is the most prestigious tournament in poker — the one title every serious player dreams of, and the closest thing the game has to a world championship. Since 1970, a new champion has been crowned almost every summer in Las Vegas, each one earning a gold bracelet, a life-changing payday, and a permanent place in poker history.

So who has actually won the WSOP Main Event? Below you’ll find the complete, verified list of champions by year, from the legends who built the game to the modern grinders battling fields of more than 10,000 players. The most recent champion is Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi, who won the 2025 Main Event for $10,000,000 and cemented one of the greatest résumés the game has ever seen.

The Current WSOP Main Event Champion: Michael Mizrachi (2025)

The reigning WSOP Main Event champion is Michael Mizrachi of the United States. In July 2025, “The Grinder” defeated a field of 9,735 players to win his eighth WSOP bracelet and the $10,000,000 first prize from a prize pool of more than $90.5 million — the third-largest Main Event in history at the time.

Mizrachi’s victory was historic on multiple levels. Just 19 days earlier, he had won the $50,000 Poker Players Championship for a record fourth time, making him the first player ever to capture both the Main Event and the Poker Players Championship in the same year. He also became the first previous multiple-bracelet winner to win the Main Event since Stu Ungar in 1997. In recognition of the achievement, poker’s establishment — including Phil Hellmuth, Phil Ivey, and Daniel Negreanu — pushed for his immediate induction into the Poker Hall of Fame, waiving the usual voting process entirely.

The 2025 final table was also notable for Leo Margets, who became just the second woman to reach a Main Event final table and the first since Barbara Enright in 1995. She finished seventh for $1.5 million, the largest Main Event cash by a woman in WSOP history.

(Note: The 2026 WSOP Main Event is underway in Las Vegas as of this writing, so Mizrachi remains the reigning world champion until a new winner is crowned.)

Complete List of WSOP Main Event Winners by Year (1970–2025)

Here is every WSOP Main Event champion, listed by year with their home country. This is the definitive answer to “who has won the WSOP Main Event.”

WSOP Main Event Winners of the Modern Era: Prizes and Field Sizes

Over the past decade, the Main Event has exploded into a genuine mega-event, routinely drawing fields of 8,000 to more than 10,000 players and paying eight-figure first prizes. Here’s a closer look at the recent champions and the money they won.

*The 2020 Main Event was played under a unique split format during the COVID-19 pandemic, with separate domestic and international online events feeding into a live heads-up championship. Damian Salas won that final showdown to be crowned world champion.

Daniel Weinman’s $12.1 million score in 2023 is the largest first-place prize in WSOP Main Event history, surpassing Jamie Gold’s famous $12 million win from 2006, which had stood as the record for 17 years.

A Brief History of the WSOP Main Event, Era by Era

The Binion’s Era: Poker’s Founding Fathers (1970–1990)

The Main Event began in 1970 at Binion’s Horseshoe in downtown Las Vegas. That first “championship” wasn’t even a tournament in the modern sense — casino owner Benny Binion invited a handful of the world’s best players, and the title of world champion was decided by a vote of his peers, which went to the great Johnny Moss. Moss would go on to win again in 1971 and 1974, giving him three Main Event titles — a record that still stands.

These early years were dominated by road gamblers and Texas legends: Amarillo Slim Preston (1972), Puggy Pearson (1973), Sailor Roberts (1975), and the incomparable Doyle Brunson, who won back-to-back titles in 1976 and 1977 — both times, famously, holding the same unlikely hand, ten-deuce, which is now known throughout poker as “the Doyle Brunson.”

Two more milestones defined this era. In 1979, Hal Fowler became the first amateur to win the Main Event, and in 1990, Mansour Matloubi became the first non-American champion, opening the door for the global game to come.

The Stu Ungar and Johnny Chan Dynasties

No player is more mythologized in Main Event lore than Stu Ungar. A once-in-a-generation talent, “The Kid” won in 1980 and 1981, then vanished into personal turmoil for over a decade before staging one of sport’s great comebacks to win again in 1997 — matching Johnny Moss’s record of three titles.

The late 1980s belonged to Johnny Chan, who won consecutive championships in 1987 and 1988 and came within one hand of an unprecedented three-peat in 1989. The player who denied him was a brash 24-year-old named Phil Hellmuth, who became the youngest champion in history at the time. Chan’s 1988 victory was later immortalized in the poker film Rounders, helping introduce the Main Event to a mainstream audience.

The Moneymaker Effect and the Poker Boom (2003–2010)

If one moment changed poker forever, it was 2003. An amateur accountant from Tennessee with the almost-too-perfect name Chris Moneymaker qualified for the Main Event through a small online satellite that cost him as little as $86 — then beat a field of professionals to win $2.5 million. His victory, broadcast on ESPN with hole-card cameras, convinced millions of viewers that anyone could do it.

The result was the “poker boom.” Entries skyrocketed year over year, and the first prize ballooned. In 2006, Jamie Gold topped a then-record field of 8,773 players to win a staggering $12 million — a first-prize record that would last nearly two decades. The era also produced a run of remarkably young champions: Peter Eastgate broke Hellmuth’s youngest-winner record in 2008 at age 22, only for Joe Cada to break it again the very next year at 21.

The November Nine and the Global Era (2008–2019)

From 2008 through 2016, the WSOP paused the Main Event once the field reached its final nine players, resuming months later for a televised finale dubbed the “November Nine.” The delay built enormous hype and turned the final table into appointment viewing.

This period also confirmed poker as a truly international game. Champions came from Canada (Jonathan Duhamel, 2010), Germany (Pius Heinz, 2011, the country’s first Main Event winner), Sweden (Martin Jacobson, 2014), and Vietnam (Qui Nguyen, 2016 — no relation to 1998 champion Scotty Nguyen). Germany’s Hossein Ensan closed out the decade with a $10 million win in 2019.

The Record-Breaking Modern Era (2020–2025)

After the disrupted 2020 event, the Main Event came roaring back bigger than ever. Koray Aldemir won in 2021, and Norway’s Espen Jørstad took the title in 2022. Then came a run of record-shattering fields: Daniel Weinman topped 10,043 entrants in 2023 to win the largest first prize ever ($12.1 million), and Jonathan Tamayo broke the attendance record again in 2024 with 10,112 players.

The era’s defining story, though, is Michael Mizrachi’s 2025 triumph — a dominant wire-to-wire final-table performance that completed a summer for the ages and sent him straight into the Hall of Fame.

WSOP Main Event Records and Milestones

For fans who love the record book, here are the key marks in Main Event history:

• Most Main Event titles: Johnny Moss and Stu Ungar, three each.
• Back-to-back champions: Johnny Moss’s era aside, Doyle Brunson (1976–77) and Johnny Chan (1987–88) are the only players to win in consecutive years.
• Largest first prize ever: Daniel Weinman, $12,100,000 (2023).
• Largest field ever: 10,112 entrants (2024).
• First non-American champion: Mansour Matloubi (1990).
• First amateur champion: Hal Fowler (1979).
• Youngest champion ever: Joe Cada, age 21 (2009).
• Most WSOP bracelets overall: Phil Hellmuth, with 17 (across all events, not just the Main Event).
• Women at the final table: Only Barbara Enright (5th, 1995) and Leo Margets (7th, 2025) have ever reached a Main Event final table.

FAQs

Who has won the most WSOP Main Events?

Johnny Moss and Stu Ungar share the record with three Main Event titles each. Moss won in 1970, 1971, and 1974; Ungar won in 1980, 1981, and 1997. No other player has won more than one.

Who won the first WSOP Main Event?

Johnny Moss won the inaugural 1970 event. Notably, that first title wasn’t decided by a traditional tournament — the world champion was chosen by a vote of the participating players.

What is the biggest WSOP Main Event first prize ever?

Daniel Weinman’s $12,100,000 win in 2023 is the largest first-place prize in Main Event history, edging out Jamie Gold’s $12 million from 2006.

Has a woman ever won the WSOP Main Event?

No woman has won the Main Event outright. However, Barbara Enright (5th in 1995) and Leo Margets (7th in 2025) have both reached the final table, with Margets recording the largest Main Event cash ever by a woman.

How much does it cost to enter the WSOP Main Event?

The Main Event has a $10,000 buy-in. Many players qualify for far less through online and live satellite tournaments — the path Chris Moneymaker famously used to win in 2003.

Who won the 2025 WSOP Main Event?

Michael “The Grinder” Mizrachi won the 2025 WSOP Main Event, defeating a field of 9,735 players for $10,000,000 and his eighth career bracelet. He was inducted into the Poker Hall of Fame the same day.

The Bottom Line

From Johnny Moss being voted world champion in a smoky Las Vegas casino in 1970 to Michael Mizrachi conquering a field of nearly 10,000 players in 2025, the WSOP Main Event has grown into the ultimate proving ground in poker. Its list of champions reads like a hall of fame in its own right — road gamblers, online qualifiers, amateurs, and all-time greats, each of whom answered the same question every player still asks every summer in Las Vegas: can I be the one who wins it all?

Bookmark this page and check back after each summer’s series — as long as the cards are in the air, there will always be a new name to add to the list.