Prizes for cracked aces? PokerStars launches its first 'bad beat jackpots'

Posted on: February 10, 2025 09:35 PST

Players more familiar with live cash games will likely be aware of ‘bad beat jackpot’ promotions, which pay out when extremely strong poker hands are beaten by even better hands. One element that makes them popular among certain players is that the entire table generally benefits from a percentage of the payout, which is often funded by an additional rake taken from each pot.

GGPoker is one online operator that has operated a progressive bad beat jackpot in its cash games, but to date the feature has more widely been restricted to live games - and has never featured on a PokerStars platform. Now players on PokerStars’ Spanish, French and Portuguese sites can win up to €5,500 by getting unlucky in certain no-limit hold’em (NLH) and pot-limit Omaha (PLO) cash games.

There’s also a consolation prize for players who lose with pocket aces - see below for details.

Cash rewards linked to stakes

Under the name ‘Bad Beat Payback’, cash game players in NLH and PLO games with stakes of up to €2.5/€5 will win instant prizes if they lose with a straight flush or quads. The higher the stakes, the bigger the prizes.

Here’s a quick breakdown of the prizes to be won as part of the Bad Beat Payback:

Losing hand	Prize
Straight flush	1,100 big blinds in cash
Quads	600 big blinds in cash
Pocket aces	€1,000 All-in Shootout ticket

SWIPE FOR MORE

The €1,000 All-in Shootout tickets awarded to cracked aces require nothing on the player’s part, as All-in Shootouts are essentially lotteries in which every entrant is all-in on every hand; players are not required to even be logged-in to take part once credited with a ticket.

These All-in Shootouts will award €100 tourney tickets (including to the upcoming Carnaval Main Event), €250 Sunday Million tickets, plus Power Path tickets worth €1-10. The Bad Beat Payback is running now in Spain, France and Portugal, with no end date announced.

Sadly, these bad beats will only reward the losing player, rather than everyone at their table. Whether this feature will eventually make it to other regions, such as North Anerica or the worldwide .COM market, is currently unknown.