The beloved GGMasters began six years ago as a “people’s” major tournament: a $150 buy-in, a $300,000 guarantee, and a simple draw for the masses. This year, however, GGPoker pulled an ace from its sleeve for the 6th anniversary—keeping the buy-in but raising the guarantee to an astounding $10,000,000. The tournament featured seven starting flights (three on February 1st, three on February 8th, and the final one on February 9th), requiring a massive 72,464 entries to meet the guarantee.
From Birthday Celebration to Record Overlay
Even giants can hit a ceiling. And since this was a freezeout format, there was no room for endless re-entries that often salvage guarantees in other online series. The result? A massive value for players but the most expensive marketing “bonus” in the history of online tournaments for the operator.
When only two hours of registration remained and the overlay stood at $2.6 million, the internet was buzzing with this story. As one X user pointed out, had registration closed at that moment, we would have witnessed the largest overlay in the history of poker (both live and online).
🤯 Wow, so GGPoker's GGMasters is heading for a record overlay.
— Anuj Arora (@anuj2212) February 9, 2026
Currently, overlaying by $2.6 million. 2 hours of late registration still remaining.
Very likely end up being the biggest overlay in the history of online poker.
For context, India's PokerBaazi's GOAT… pic.twitter.com/IgK5Z0uaeS
The final two hours managed to save the tournament from an even bigger deficit, reducing the overlay to below $2 million, thus not surpassing the record overlays held by the Seminole HRPO 2014 and WPT World Championship 2023. However, it didn't escape one unfortunate record—$1,791,760 became the largest overlay ever seen in online poker. Previously, the record was held by India's PokerBaazi GOAT ($1,400,000) from 2024.
Bold Move or Biting Off More Than They Could Chew?
In practice, this means all players making it into the ITM can enjoy the massive value the room adds from its own pocket. This tournament instantly raised the question of whether future guarantees for similar buy-ins will be more conservative. Especially since last year's anniversary GGMasters with a $5,000,000 guarantee faced technical challenges, and now we know how this year's event turned out. Nevertheless, this story will be talked about in the poker community for a long time.
The 5 Largest Overlays in Poker History (live/online):
| Rank | Event | Guarantee | Overlay |
| 1 | Seminole Hard Rock Poker Open 2014 ($5,300) | $10,000,000 | $2,500,000 |
| 2 | WPT World Championship 2023 ($10,400) | $40,000,000 | $2,400,000 |
| 3 | GGPoker GGMasters 6th Anniversary 2026 ($150) | $10,000,000 | $1,791,760 |
| 4 | PokerBaazi GOAT 2024 ($120) | $2,975,000 | $1,400,000 |
| 5 | PokerStars The Big Blowout 2020 ($109) | $5,000,000 | $1,230,000 |
Sources – X, GGPoker
