The clock is running on WSOP Paradise. The World Series of Poker's Bahamas festival returns to the Baha Mar Hotel & Resort from December 2 to 17, 2026, with 20 gold bracelet events and $120 million in total guaranteed prize pools — and the two early-bird accommodation packages attached to it require deposits by October 31.
For players planning a December trip, that deadline is six weeks away.
The packages
The WSOP has introduced two tiered early-bird packages, both structured around committed tournament buy-in volume rather than an upfront accommodation fee.
The $100,000 package requires a minimum of $100,000 in tournament buy-ins, which must include Day 1a of the GGMillion$ and the Super Main Event. In return, players receive a 16-night stay from December 2 to 18 in a Baha Mar Deluxe Room with resort fees included. A $5,000 deposit is required by October 31.
The $300,000 package requires a minimum of $300,000 in tournament buy-ins on the same basis, and adds a VIP fast-track meet-and-greet on arrival, return airport transfers and complimentary buffet access to the 16-night stay. A $10,000 deposit is required by October 31.
In both cases, the deposit is fully released once the tournament play requirements are met. Functionally, it is a bond rather than a payment — the WSOP is guaranteeing itself the buy-in volume before comping the room.
Who this is actually for
Let us be direct: these packages are for high rollers. A $100,000 buy-in commitment is not a recreational proposition, and the structure explicitly requires entry into two of the most expensive events on the schedule.
What the packages reveal is how the WSOP now thinks about Paradise. The Las Vegas summer series is a mass-participation festival built on $400 to $1,500 events with thousands of entrants. Paradise is the opposite: a compressed, destination-led, high-buy-in festival where the economics run on a few hundred wealthy players rather than tens of thousands of regular ones.
Comping sixteen nights at a Bahamian luxury resort is expensive. Doing it in exchange for a guaranteed $100,000 of rake-bearing buy-ins is straightforward arithmetic.
The headline event
The Super Main Event anchors the schedule with a $50 million guarantee — among the largest guarantees ever attached to a single poker tournament. GGPoker's qualifier packages for the event have been valued at $30,000, including a $26,000 Super Main Event entry plus 13 nights at Baha Mar.
That qualifier route is where most players will actually get there. GGPoker's WSOP Express pathway runs a step system starting from $0.50 all-in-or-fold sit-and-gos, progressing through Spin & Gold, target-stack turbo tournaments, and $150 direct qualifiers into weekly $2,500 Super Satellite Finals that guarantee 25 packages per week.
A player who ladders up from a $0.50 satellite to a $30,000 package has produced one of the best returns available anywhere in poker. A player who spends $3,000 chasing it has not. The difference is discipline, and it is worth being honest with yourself about which side you are on before starting.
Twenty bracelets, and what that means
Twenty gold bracelets in a 16-day festival is a lot of hardware for a compressed schedule. For comparison, the summer WSOP in Las Vegas spreads roughly a hundred bracelet events across seven weeks, and GGPoker's online WSOP programme accounted for 33 more in 2026.
The proliferation of bracelets has been a running debate in poker for a decade. The traditionalist objection is that a bracelet used to mean winning one of a dozen events against the best players alive, and now means winning one of roughly 150 annually across three continents and two mediums.
The counter-argument is that the fields at Paradise are, if anything, harder than the summer fields. A $25,000-plus buy-in event in the Bahamas in December draws the high roller circuit almost exclusively. The bracelet may be more numerous, but the competition for this particular set is severe.
What this means for players
If you are not buying a package, you can still plan around the festival. The schedule is public and the satellite routes are open. December in the Bahamas is a genuine destination trip, and the smaller events on a 20-bracelet schedule are more accessible than the Super Main headline suggests.
Satellite equity is the value here. The single best risk-adjusted route into a $50 million guaranteed event is a cheap satellite with a package prize, because you are converting a small fixed cost into a large fixed-value prize. Our tournaments hub covers satellite structures and where they run, and the ICM explainer is essential reading — satellite play is the purest ICM environment in poker, where chips above the qualifying threshold are worth literally nothing.
Budget the trip, not just the buy-in. Players consistently underestimate the total cost of a destination festival. Flights, non-comped accommodation, food and the near-certainty of playing more events than planned add up fast. Our bankroll management guide covers how to ring-fence travel costs separately from playing bankroll.
Qualify online where you can. Multiple operators run routes into December's major festivals. Compare the options across our real money poker rankings, and check the satellite schedules at BetOnline and Americas Cardroom if you are playing from a market where GGPoker is unavailable.
The December calendar is crowded
Paradise is not the only thing happening. The WPT World Championship at Wynn Las Vegas runs November 27 through December 21 with over 85 events and more than $20 million in guarantees, overlapping Paradise almost entirely.
That overlap is deliberate on both sides and forces a genuine choice for travelling professionals. Las Vegas offers volume, familiarity and lower travel costs. The Bahamas offers larger guarantees and a smaller, wealthier field.
Most players will pick one. The ones who can afford both will be on a plane in the middle of December, which is its own kind of answer about where the money is.
For players planning ahead, our WSOP schedule page tracks the announced calendar, and WSOP 2026 results covers the year's bracelet winners to date.
Package terms as announced by the WSOP. Deposit and eligibility conditions are set by the operator and subject to change.