For years, PokerStars has had held on to the crown as the largest online poker room in the world — most of that time, overwhelmingly so. However, over the last five months, GG Poker has given the two-decade-old poker room a run for their money.
According to a recent report from Pokerfuse GG Poker has once again equaled PokerStars traffic, with both poker rooms sitting around a 7 day traffic average of 6000 players according to PokerScout.
When the poker world looks back on 2021, one of the biggest stories of the year will be how PokerStars’ 15-year dominance of the online marketplace was finally reined in by GGPoker.
@d0minick with the analysis ⬇️https://t.co/ARwff5V2ks
— pokerfuse (@pokerfuse) December 17, 2021
It wasn’t the first time that the two sites have had their traffic levels meet.
GG Poker first caught up to PokerStars during June 2021. Since then, have bounced back and forth numerous times since, despite PokerStars regaining the lead in late October and holding the position until the most recent convergence.
The two online poker rooms have been at the top of traffic rankings in recent years, including all of 2021. Following PokerStars and GG Poker in the standings, are a group of medium-sized sites and networks such as IDNPoker, Winamax.fr and iPoker, which is home to many poker rooms including Bet365 and William Hill, some of the oldest online gambling sites in existence.
Why is GGPoker gaining ground on PokerStars?
At the beginning of the year, PokerStars traffic numbers were more than double that of its closest rival. But since then, GG Poker has defied expectations and is now neck and neck with an online poker institution in PokerStars.
So what has been the catalyst that has put PokerStars out of favor in relation to GG Poker? Some of it is due to PokerStars having fallen out of favor with some players, while some of it can be traced to online trends as a whole, not to mention the emergence of GG Poker.
PokerStars general decline
After the pandemic surge of online poker in 2020, traffic numbers across the online poker world have waned in 2021 as players gradually had previous options return — including live poker and other entertainment choices. But PokerStars has seen its traffic decline more than most online poker rooms have.
During the same timeframe, GG Poker’s traffic has been steady throughout the spring and summer, followed by seasonal increases this fall and winter, which PokerStars has also enjoyed.
WSOP bracelets awarded through GG Poker
GG Poker has almost certainly seen its standing with players rise due to the World Series of Poker’s partnership with GG Poker. Starting in 2020, GG Poker played host to dozens of online World Series of Poker gold bracelet events for non-US players. These events undoubtedly gave the poker room new exposure and subsequently more sign-ups.
A total of 54 bracelets were awarded on GG Poker in 2020 with another 33 during 2021. GG Poker also was a big part of crowing the 2020 World Series of Poker champion Damian Salas, who qualified through the international portion via GG Poker.
The introduction of WSOP events to GG Poker has also coincided with the signing of some big names in the world of poker over the last few years. Daniel Negreanu was most the prominent poker personality to join GG Poker after departing PokerStars, but they have also managed to snag some other poker heavyweights such as Jason Koon, Fedor Holz and ElkY. They even made a play for the casual player by adding Instagram King Dan Bilzerian to the GG Poker team.
With names like these and momentum from the World Series of Poker, GG Poker looks like they might be just getting started.
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