WPT Global Bets on Classic Freezeouts with New “One Shot” Tournament Series

In a bold move that challenges the dominance of re-entry tournaments in online poker, WPT Global has launched a new freezeout-focused tournament brand: One Shot. The series revives the traditional poker format, offering players a single chance to make a deep run — no rebuys, no second bullets.

According to Poker Industry Pro, the One Shot tournaments run three times daily with a $15 fixed buy-in and a total guaranteed prize pool of $7,000. Two of the daily events feature the increasingly popular Progressive Knockout (PKO) format, each guaranteeing $2,000. The third event is a pure freezeout with a $3,000 guarantee, including a time slot designed to suit players in Asian time zones.

Each tournament is played 8-handed with a 10,000 starting stack, blinds increasing every 10 minutes, and late registration open for nearly three hours (16–17 levels). The rake is set at a competitive 9%.

The One Shot initiative comes at a time when traditional freezeouts have become scarce across most major online poker platforms. A decade ago, freezeouts — where players had one entry and no option to re-enter — were the norm. Over time, however, the landscape shifted in favor of re-entry formats, driven by operators looking to boost prize pools and revenues, and players seeking multiple shots at a big score.

While re-entry tournaments do increase overall engagement, they tend to favor well-funded professionals who can afford to play a high-variance, aggressive style. This has left many recreational players longing for the simplicity and fairness of single-entry events.

The move by WPT Global follows similar attempts by other platforms to keep freezeouts alive. GGPoker’s GGMasters series has been one of the most successful examples, offering daily freezeout tournaments and a marquee $1 million guaranteed Sunday edition. 888poker also launched The Classic, a series built around “pure poker” with no re-entries, and even hosted full freezeout festivals.

PartyPoker, which once promoted freezeouts heavily, has since scaled back, although its client still includes a filter specifically for freezeout events. Unibet Poker and the Winning Poker Network (WPN) continue to offer a limited selection of freezeouts, while 888poker and the iPoker network have reduced their freezeout presence to just one regular tournament.

Even PokerStars, once known for hosting many freezeout majors, now offers few such events outside of flagship series like SCOOP and WCOOP. The current daily schedule includes no freezeouts at all.

Live poker has also followed suit. The 2025 World Series of Poker (WSOP) schedule features only about 24 freezeout events out of 100 — a significant drop from the 35 offered last year and a far cry from the freezeout-heavy lineups of 15 years ago.

With One Shot, WPT Global appears to be making a calculated bet on the enduring appeal of freezeouts. The brand joins other recent tournament innovations from the operator, such as Hyper Dash, a fast-paced format running every 30 minutes, and WPT Daily Prime and WPT Daily Asia, which cater to regional time zones and preferences.

The question remains whether other poker operators will follow WPT Global’s lead and bring back more freezeouts — or whether the current trend of unlimited re-entries and extended late registration will continue to dominate.

For now, One Shot offers a refreshing throwback to the days when a single bullet was all you had, and all you needed.

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