Poker players received an early Christmas present from the World Series of Poker on Thursday with the announcement of key dates for the 50th Annual WSOP.

The summer festival will take place at the Rio All-Suites Hotel and Casino from May 28 to July 16. It’s a milestone for the longest-running tournament series, and as such the World Series of Poker has a number of special events to commemorate the occasion.

The ‘Big 50’

The first of the celebratory events is the ‘Big 50.’ The new addition to the schedule offers players a $500 rake-free shot at a bracelet.

The tournament, which takes place on opening weekend, comes with a $5,000,000 guarantee and promises no less than $1,000,000 to the winner. The WSOP is hoping The Big 50 will be one of their biggest tournaments of all time.

“We’re excited to commence our golden event,” said WSOP Executive Director Ty Stewart. “We expect our opening weekend Big 50 event to be one of the largest in our history, and certainly one of the best value tournaments ever offered. This is part of our concerted plans to make the 2019 WSOP a better value all-around.”

The Big 50 kicks off on May 30 and has four starting flights. While a structure sheet is not available, players will start with a 50,000 starting stack and play 50-minute levels. Players are allowed one re-entry per starting flight. The initial buy-in for the Big 50 is rake-free, with all $500 going directly into the prize pool. Subsequent re-entries, including entries into future starting flights, are subject to rake.

The Main Event

The WSOP Main Event gets underway on July 3 and plays out to completion on July 16. Wall-to-wall broadcast coverage will place on both ESPN and PokerGO.

For the 50th WSOP, the Main Event will be just a little deeper than in years past with a 60,000 starting stack but will continue to be a freeze out with two-hour levels.

Other events announced include the return of the $1,500 Millionaire Maker, both the $1,000 Double Stack and $1,500 Monster Stack, the 888poker sponsored $888 Crazy Eights and the popular $1,000 Seniors Event.

2019 World Series of Poker Key Events

DATE	EVENT	BUY-IN	CHIPS	LEVELS	RE-ENTRY	GUARANTEE	START TIME (PT)
5/30	Big 50 NLHE	$500	50,000	50 min	1/flight	$5M $1M for 1st	11 a.m.
5/31	“	$500	50,000	50 min	1/flight		11 a.m.
6/1	“	$500	50,000	50 min	1/flight		10 a.m.
6/2	“	$500	50,000	50 min	1/flight		10 a.m.
6/7	Millionaire Maker NLHE	$1,500	25,000	60 min	1/flight	$1M for 1st	10 a.m.
6/8	“	$1,500	25,000	60 min	1/flight		10 a.m.
6/13	Seniors NLHE (50+)	$1,000	20,000	60 min	1		10 a.m.
6/14	Double Stack NLHE	$1,000	40,000	60 min	1/flight		10 a.m.
6/15	“	$1,000	40,000	60 min	1/flight		10 a.m.
6/21	Monster Stack NLHE	$1,500	50,000	60 min	–		10 a.m.
6/22	“	$1,500	50,000	60 min	–		10 a.m.
6/28	Crazy Eights NLHE	$888	40,000	30/60 min Day 1/2	Unlimited	$888,888 for 1st	10 a.m./5 p.m.
6/29	“	$888	40,000	30/60 min Day 1/2	Unlimited		10 a.m.
6/30	“	$888	40,000	30/60 min Day 1/2	Unlimited		10 a.m.
7/3	WSOP ME – Day 1a	$10,000	60000	2 hrs.	–	–	12 p.m.
7/4	Day 1b	$10,000	60000	2 hrs.	–	–	12 p.m.
7/5	Day 1c	$10,000	60000	2 hrs.	–	–	12 p.m.

A notable difference in each of these events for 2019 is the starting stacks being given to players. In every event, the starting stacks have been dramatically increased. Some of which have been augmented as much as four times as in previous years.

Though all of the announced dates and tournaments are subject to change, players can now begin planning their summer of bracelet hunting around a few of these key, large field tournaments.

WSOP officials will announce the entire 2019 World Series of Poker schedule in the first quarter of 2019.