The GUKPT Grand Final is heading back to London. The Grosvenor UK Poker Tour closes its 2026 season at The Victoria Casino from November 19 to 29, with £1.2 million in guaranteed prize pools spread across a festival built for everyone from satellite grinders to high-roller regulars.
With the Leeds stop now complete, this is the point where the UK's longest-running regional poker tour pivots to its season finale. Here is what you need to know about the schedule, the structure and how to get a seat without paying full price.
Festival overview
The Grand Final runs for eleven days at The Victoria, with satellites beginning on November 18. According to PokerNews' preview, the guaranteed prize pools total £1.2 million across the headline events, and online closing events run on November 30 and December 1 for those who prefer to finish the festival from home.
The core events are:
- £1,800 Main Event with a £500,000 guarantee
- £1,100 Midi with a £250,000 guarantee
- £2,300 High Roller with a £150,000 guarantee
- £300 Mini Main with a £150,000 guarantee
Alongside those sit PLO variants, a £500 GUKPT Cup and deeper-stack tournaments, so there is plenty to play beyond the marquee events.
The Main Event schedule
The £1,800 Main Event offers three starting flights: Thursday November 26, Friday November 27, and a turbo flight also on Friday November 27. Day 2 follows on Saturday November 28, with the final stages on Sunday November 29.
That compressed finish is typical of UK regional festivals and worth planning around. If you are travelling for the event, book accommodation through the Sunday, because a deep run will not leave you time to leave on Saturday night.
The Midi is the better option for players who want a late-November warm-up. It has multiple starting flights between November 19 and 21, including turbo and hyper options, and concludes on November 22. The High Roller begins on Wednesday November 25, giving Main Event hopefuls a chance to arrive early and acclimatise.
Last year's champion and what it tells us
The 2025 Grand Final Main Event was won by Alan Stearn, who survived with just three big blinds at one stage before going on to collect £125,645 from a field of 334 entries. That detail is worth dwelling on for two reasons.
First, it gives us a realistic benchmark for the 2026 field. With a £500,000 guarantee on a £1,800 buy-in, the guarantee requires several hundred entries once fees are taken out of each buy-in, so last year's 334 runners sit comfortably above the line. If turnout holds, the prize pool should clear the guarantee without an overlay, though that is always a risk for organisers and a bonus for players if entries disappoint.
Second, Stearn's three-big-blind survival is a reminder that tournament poker is about outlasting variance as much as outplaying opponents. Short stacks have real equity in the later stages. Our poker odds guide and odds calculator are useful for understanding just how often a short stack doubles up when it is all in.
How to qualify cheaply
One of the best features of the GUKPT is its qualification ladder. According to the tour, satellites begin at just £1 online, progressing through £5 and £30 tiers. Live Event Credit can be used towards any GUKPT tournament, which is a flexible touch that lets you redirect winnings to whichever event suits your schedule.
On site, Target Cashout Satellites offering five to ten seats at buy-ins between £125 and £250 provide another route. The format is player-friendly: instead of a single prize, multiple seats are awarded, which lowers the variance of satellite play compared with winner-takes-all structures.
If you are new to satellites, a few principles help:
- Play tighter than your chip stack suggests. When the prize is a seat rather than a cash prize, extra chips beyond the seat threshold have little value. This is classic ICM thinking, covered in our ICM explainer.
- Know the bubble. Players with medium stacks should fold more often than they would in a standard tournament, because survival is worth more than chips.
- Use the credit wisely. Live Event Credit means you can enter a cheaper event if your satellite win comes late in the festival.
Why the Grand Final matters for UK poker
The GUKPT has been a staple of British poker for years, and the Grand Final is its showpiece. In an environment where UK players face rising costs and tight gambling taxes, a festival with a clearly defined guarantee, satellite pathways starting at £1 and a central London venue is a rare combination.
It also sits within a broader autumn rush. Grosvenor's own calendar is crowded, as we covered in our Grosvenor October schedule round-up, and the recent Leeds stop produced a dramatic comeback victory, which we detailed in our Leeds Main Event report. For readers who follow UK poker, the Grand Final is the natural climax of that narrative.
If you play online as well as live, our UK poker page lists the sites and licensing considerations relevant to British players, while our online vs live poker comparison helps you decide where to put your time and money.
What this means for players
Three practical points stand out.
Budget for the whole festival, not just the Main Event. Between the Midi, the High Roller and the Mini Main, you could play four events of different sizes. A common mistake is to spend your entire bankroll on one high-variance entry. Our bankroll management guide suggests how many buy-ins to hold per format.
Take advantage of the turbo flights if you are time-constrained. The turbo Main Event flight on November 27 lets you start late and still make Day 2 on Saturday, but turbo structures increase variance and reduce the value of postflop skill.
Treat satellites as your edge. At £1 to £30, online satellites let a disciplined player turn a tiny stake into a £1,800 seat. If you play them well, the effective cost of entry drops dramatically.
The takeaway
The 2026 GUKPT Grand Final is shaping up as a high-quality UK festival: £1.2 million in guarantees, a Main Event structure that has produced exciting finishes, and a satellite system that gives recreational players a genuine shot. If you are anywhere near London in late November, it deserves a place on your calendar.
Before you go, check the official Grosvenor schedule for any last-minute changes to flights or buy-ins, and use our tournaments page to compare other upcoming events if you want to build a multi-festival travel plan.