Poker is one of the most popular card games in the United States, and nowhere is this more evident than inside Las Vegas casinos.
Sin City is home to the World Series of Poker, which after 17 years at an off-Strip casino, moved back to the Strip in 2022. Last year’s main event took place at the Horseshoe casino-hotel and the first place winner walked away with a $10 million payout.
There are currently nine poker rooms on Strip (not counting the temporarily closed room at Caesars Palace casino-hotel) and 18 poker rooms in the Las Vegas Valley.
The number of poker rooms in casinos has declined in the years following the online poker boom. According to data from the University of Nevada-Las Vegas Center for Gaming Research, the high-water mark for the number of open poker rooms in the Silver State was 114 in 2009. In 2023, there were 484 tables across 39 open poker rooms in Nevada.
According to public data, poker generated more than $228.9 million in revenue for Nevada gaming licencees in 2023, up more than 4.5 percent from the previous year. That figure represents roughly 4.4 percent of the table games revenue ($5.2 billion) reported by Nevada gambling establishments last year and less than 1.5 percent of the statewide total gaming win ($15.5 billion).
Here is a look at the five largest poker rooms (by number of tables) on the Strip.
The Venetian Las Vegas
The newest poker room in the city is also the largest. Venetian casino-hotel debuted its brand-new, 14,000-square-foot poker room this summer. The Venetian’s new poker room is located on the second floor of the Grand Canal Shoppes.
The Poker Room at The Venetian will host cash games and the DeepStack poker tournament series.
Bellagio Hotel & Casino
The nearly 7,000-square-foot Bellagio Poker Room, which opened in 1998, features 37 tables. The poker room at Bellagio offers daily cash games and hosts World Poker Tournament events.
The Bellagio Poker Room is open 24 hours a day with tableside food and beverage service.
Resorts World Las Vegas
Bucking the trend of new casino resorts opening sans a poker room, the Genting Berhad-owned property at the North end of the Strip went all in on poker. Resorts World casino-hotel’s poker room features 29 tables.
Resorts World Poker Room offers a variety of games and tournaments, including No Limit Texas Hold’em, Pot Limit Omaha and mixed games.
Wynn Las Vegas
The Wynn poker room is located at the Encore casino-hotel after moving over to a more spacious location in 2016. The Wynn casino-hotel poker room features 28 tables.
The room is open 24 hours a day with $1/$2, $2/$5 and $5/$10 No Limit Hold’em games.
MGM Grand Las Vegas
The flagship property of MGM Resorts International on the Las Vegas Strip is home to a sprawling poker room with 25 tables. The poker room at MGM Grand casino-hotel is described (by MGM Resorts) as the “$1-$2 No Limit Capital of Las Vegas.”
The non-smoking poker room is open 24 hours a day.
David Danzis can be contacted at ddanzis@reviewjournal.com or (702) 383-0378. Follow AC2Vegas_Danzis on X.