It’s a no-brainer that tens of thousands of poker players visiting Nevada during the WSOP is going to increase their online poker traffic. But as we enter the mid stages of the 2015 WSOP, the question remains, just how much will iPoker traffic increase?
Last year’s WSOP, with its 82,360 players, helped produce a 24% online poker uptick in the first week alone. The 2015 edition is supposed to bring even more overall players thanks to the Colossus and three more events (68 total). That said, let’s look at how the 2015 WSOP is already boosting Nevada’s lone poker site, WSOP.com.
How WSOP.com Traffic is doing Now
As we enter mid-June, this site’s traffic has increased from an average of 170 cash game players per hour, to 190 players per hour (according to PokerScout). Moreover, peak hourly levels before the WSOP began were at 315 players, while the current peak is 451 players. With almost 50 tournaments left to play out, let’s discuss why these figures should continue increasing.
1. Ultimate Poker is No Longer around
What’s unique about Nevada’s online poker situation this year is that it’ll be the first WSOP without Ultimate Poker involved since the market opened in April 2013. UP closed last November, leaving only WSOP.com and Real Gaming left. Real Gaming has never been a serious player in this market, which means the WSOP’s poker site is the only game in Nevada.
2. Compact with Delaware
Delaware may not be the biggest state (935,614 residents), but their sharing online poker players with Nevada has made a slight impact. This liquidity increase should continue being felt since Delaware residents can play in the now-larger selection of cash tables with poker pros currently in Nevada.
3. WSOP.com has more than doubled their Signup Bonus
The WSOP definitely doesn’t want this summer opportunity to pass them by since they’ve increased their signup bonus to a 100% match up to $1,000. The standard deal here is a 100% match bonus up to $400, so you can see that the current offer is definitely better. The potential $1k signup bonus will be available from now until July 14th.
It’s not hard to see that Nevada online poker has a lot going on for itself until the middle of July. So it will be interesting to see just how much the 2015 WSOP increases iPoker traffic and revenue in the end.