EPT 2027 Schedule: Five Stops, a New €5,000 Main Event and Cheaper PokerStars Open Buy-Ins

PokerStars has released the full European Poker Tour calendar for 2027, and the headline is easy to say: the EPT Main Event drops to a flat €5,000 at every stop. That’s the first time in years the tour’s flagship price has gone down rather than up. Add a fifth stop in Malta, a new single price for the PokerStars Open and a cheaper Open High Roller, and you have the biggest price reset the EPT has made in a while.

Below are the full dates, what each buy-in used to cost, how big the 2026 fields were, and what the changes really mean for your bankroll and your travel plans.

EPT 2027 Dates at a Glance

• EPT Paris: February 9–20, 2027. The season opener.
• EPT Monte Carlo: April 21 – May 2, 2027. The spring stop.
• EPT Barcelona: August 15–28, 2027. Casino Barcelona, usually the biggest field of the year.
• EPT Malta: September 28 – October 9, 2027. Returns after a year off, and it’s the first time at Portomaso Casino.
• EPT Prague: November 28 – December 9, 2027. The season finale again.

Other confirmed PokerStars festivals for 2027:

• PokerStars Open Campione: January 8–17, 2027. €1,250 Main Event.
• Irish Poker Open: March 18–29, 2027. The full schedule is already published.
• PokerStars Open Namur: May 26 – June 6, 2027. €1,250 Main Event.

The 2026 season ran with just four stops: Paris, Monte Carlo, Barcelona and Prague. Malta’s return means one more chance to play an EPT Main Event in 2027, and it fills the long gap between late August and December that the 2026 calendar left open.

The Big Change: A Flat €5,000 Main Event

For the last few seasons, EPT Main Events cost €5,300. In 2027 every stop moves to €5,000. That’s €300 less per bullet, a 5.7% cut.

€300 doesn’t sound like much on a €5,000 ticket, but think about how most people play these events. Plenty of players fire two bullets. Some fire three. A player who re-entered twice in each of the five 2027 Main Events would save €4,500 compared with 2026 prices, before travel costs. For players who buy pieces of others or sell action, a round €5,000 number also makes staking deals easier to work out.

PokerStars hasn’t published the 2027 split between prize pool and fees yet. As a reference point, the 2026 Main Events put roughly €4,800 to €4,850 of each €5,300 entry into the prize pool (Paris: €7,075,200 from 1,474 entries; Monte Carlo: €4,903,350 from 1,011 entries). When the 2027 structure sheets come out, the number to check is how much of the €5,000 goes into the prize pool. A lower buy-in only helps you if the rake doesn’t eat up the saving.

How Big Were the 2026 Main Events?

• EPT Paris 2026 (€5,300): 1,474 entries, €7,075,200 prize pool. Jorge Abreu of Portugal won €1,148,600.
• EPT Monte Carlo 2026 (€5,300): 1,011 entries, €4,903,350 prize pool. Roman Stoica won €825,000.
• EPT Barcelona 2026 (€5,300): a reported 1,823 entries and €8,841,550 prize pool, with €1,370,050 for first place.
• EPT Prague 2026 (€5,300): the Main Event runs December 7–13, 2026.

These numbers show the pattern every regular already knows. Barcelona is the biggest, Paris is close behind, and Monte Carlo is the smallest but toughest field because of its high-roller crowd. A €300 discount probably won’t change Barcelona much, since it fills up anyway. The stop where a cheaper buy-in could make the most difference is Monte Carlo, where hotel prices already put off a lot of recreational players.

PokerStars Open: One Price Everywhere

The PokerStars Open (PSO) is the mid-stakes event that runs alongside each EPT, plus standalone festivals in places like Campione and Namur. Until now, its price depended on where you played:

• PSO at EPT Paris, Monte Carlo and Barcelona: €1,650 in 2026, €1,250 in 2027. That’s €400 cheaper (−24%).
• PSO at EPT Prague: cut to €1,100 in September 2026, €1,250 in 2027. That’s €150 more.
• Standalone PSO events (Campione, Namur, Málaga): €1,100 in 2026, €1,250 in 2027. That’s €150 more (+14%).
• PokerStars Open High Roller: €2,700 in 2026, €2,500 in 2027. That’s €200 cheaper (−7.4%).

So it’s a cut for some players and a price rise for others. If you only play the PSO at EPT stops, you’re €400 better off per entry. That matters, because these events get re-entered a lot. The €1,650 PSO at EPT Paris 2026 drew 2,992 entries, and more than half of them (1,599) were re-entries. At EPT Barcelona 2026, re-entries also outnumbered unique players (2,375 vs 1,958). Bring those down to €1,250 and a three-bullet player in Barcelona saves €1,200.

Players at the standalone festivals, on the other hand, pay €150 more than before. It’ll be worth watching whether PokerStars Open Campione in January 2027, the first event at the new price, holds its usual turnout.

PokerStars’ Associate Director of Live Events, Cedric Billot, explained the reasoning plainly: players had told the company that the PSO at EPT stops had become too expensive. In his words, €1,250 “brings it back within reach” while still letting PokerStars manage demand at its busiest venues.

That last part is the honest bit. A PSO at €1,100 in Barcelona would probably overflow the room. €1,250 is the middle ground: cheap enough to bring back the €1,000-ticket player, but not so cheap that turnout overwhelms the venue.

EPT Malta Returns at Portomaso

Malta dropped off the 2026 calendar, and it comes back in 2027 with a new venue: Portomaso Casino in St. Julian’s, the first time the EPT has gone there. The 2025 edition was held at the InterContinental Malta with a €5,300 Main Event, after the tour had been away from the island for nearly a decade.

For players, Malta is one of the easier EPT trips. Flights from most European cities are short and cheap, English is widely spoken, and late September is still beach weather. It’s also likely to be one of the softer Main Event fields of the year, because it sits between Barcelona and Prague and pulls in plenty of satellite qualifiers. If you’re picking just one EPT for 2027 and want the best value rather than the biggest prize pool, Malta is a strong option.

How to Plan Your 2027 EPT Season

1. Start with satellites, not direct buy-ins. EPT Paris qualifiers open on the PokerStars client on November 15, 2026. Satellites for the Irish Open and PSO Campione are already running. Paris is in February, so you have about three months of satellite runs before it starts.
   
2. Choose stops by field type, not just by name.
   

• Biggest prize pool: Barcelona (August)
• Best mix of value and travel: Malta (late September)
• Biggest field outside Barcelona: Paris (February)
• Toughest field, best scenery: Monte Carlo (April–May)
• Season finale and winter atmosphere: Prague (late November to December)

3. Budget for the PSO-plus-EPT combo. With the PSO at €1,250 and the Main at €5,000, the two flagship events now cost €6,250 together, down from €6,950 at the 2026 EPT stops. For many mid-stakes players, that turns a one-event trip into a two-event trip.
   
4. Watch for structure sheets. PokerStars says stack sizes, fees and full schedules will come out as early as possible for each festival. Before you book flights, check how much of each buy-in goes into the prize pool and the level lengths for the €1,250 PSO.
   
5. Keep an eye on the PokerStars Live League. PokerStars says more details on its live leaderboard for 2027 are coming soon. In 2026 the leaderboard paid out EPT buy-ins to the top finishers, so if you’re planning to play several stops, it could be worth extra value.
   

Is the 2027 EPT Better Value Than 2026?

For most players, yes. The tour has added a stop, cut its two biggest buy-ins at EPT festivals, and made pricing simpler. One price for the Main and one for the PSO is easier to plan around than the mix of €5,300, €1,650 and €1,100 tickets in 2026.

There are two caveats. First, standalone PokerStars Open regulars pay a little more. Second, we don’t yet know the 2027 fee breakdown. If PokerStars keeps the same euro amount as fees while lowering the buy-in, players get less real value from the cut than the headline suggests. Once the Paris structure sheets are out, we’ll update this page with the exact split.

For now, the takeaway is simple: 2027 is the cheapest the EPT has been to play in years, with more stops on the calendar. If you’ve been waiting for a good season to try your first EPT, start playing the satellites this month.

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