- PokerStars has set the standard for guaranteed tournaments, offering by far the biggest weekly schedule.
- Winamax and PokerStars offer the most competitive cash game rake, but partypoker has the lowest in MTTs.
- Loyalty programs and game offerings differ greatly between operators.
PokerStars was the first online poker room to take advantage of the historic signing that would allow operators to merge their player pools from four European countries. The worldwide leader in online poker combined its French and Spanish pool back in January and expanded the pool further by including Portuguese players in May.
A month later, GVC’s online poker room partypoker became the second operator to launch shared liquidity in Europe’s closed online markets.
Earlier this month, Winamax opened its door to Spanish players for the first time since its inception, making it the third operator to launch shared liquidity between France and Spain. The operator had to wait more than six months for the approval of its online poker license.
Playtech’s iPoker has already been approved for shared liquidity, and is expected to go live soon. 888poker operates in both Spain and Italy and is also eyeing a player pool merger.
With three major operators now successfully combining their European pool, PRO takes a closer look at their promotions, game offerings, weekly tournament guarantees, and rake.
European Shared Liquidity Networks
| PokerStars | partypoker | Winamax | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Fast Fold, Lottery Sit & Gos | Yes (no Portugal) | Yes | Yes |
| Rake in Lottery Sit & Gos | 7% – 8% | 7% | 7% |
| Rake in Cash Games | 5% – 6% | 6.67% | 5.75% |
| International Players? | Yes | No | Yes |
| Sunday Major Guarantee | €100,000 | €40,000 | €50,000 |
| Niche and Mixed Variants | Yes (Spain only) | No | Yes (France only) |
