Getting to Phnom Penh just got easier for a large slice of the region, and the timing could hardly be sharper. The World Poker Tour has confirmed that WPT Cambodia: Passport to the World Championship returns to NagaWorld from August 12 to 24, 2026, arriving exactly as Cambodia widens the door to one of poker’s most important travelling markets.
On June 15, the Royal Government of Cambodia launched a pilot visa-exemption scheme for valid PRC passport holders, running through October 15, 2026. It applies whether players arrive directly from mainland China or route through a third country, and it extends to Hong Kong and Macau travellers as well, though not to Taiwan passport holders. For a festival that leans heavily on Greater China traffic, a four-month stretch with the paperwork stripped away is a real tailwind.
A bigger build than the debut
The first edition in July 2024 already set a high bar, paying out $3,488,552 across 41 trophy events. The Championship alone pulled 913 entries and swelled to a $1,040,000 prize pool from its $500,000 guarantee. This year the schedule scales up to 70 events, every guaranteed tournament now feeds off its own satellites, and several paths carry straight through to the WPT World Championship.
Six tournaments come with guarantees: the $550 Championship Warm-Up ($75K), the $660 8-Max Survivor Bounty ($100K), the $880 Mystery Bounty ($150K), the headline $1,300 Championship ($500K), a $550 Mini Championship ($75K), and the $2,750 High Roller ($100K). Omaha grinders are looked after too, with 5-Card PLO, PLO Hi, PLO Bounty and mixed 4/5/6 PLO events dotted across the 13 days.
The Championship and the seats on the line
The centrepiece $1,300 Championship runs August 20-24 over three starting flights, with 40-minute levels through the first nine and 60-minute levels from Level 10 to heads-up. The reward goes beyond cash. The winner banks a transferable $10,400 WPT World Championship entry, while the top five each collect a transferable $1,100 WPT Prime Championship seat, all carved from the prize pool and usable at the WPT World Championship festival.
There are reasons to commit early. A High Roller Free Nights program hands out complimentary NagaWorld stays that scale with volume, from five nights at five entries up to 16 nights at fifteen, with re-entries counting. A separate Marathon Program rewards players grinding the festival’s six key events, and WPT room rates start at $55 a night for Naga 2 Superior rooms.
Why NagaWorld keeps pulling the tours
The Phnom Penh complex has become a fixture on the Asian circuit, and it is not hard to see why. Its dedicated poker room runs 11 tables and round-the-clock cash from 1/3 up to 20/40, wrapped inside a resort with 1,658 rooms and suites, more than 20 food and beverage outlets, and the 2,000-seat NABA Theatre. With the visa pilot live and the schedule nearly doubled, the August stop looks built for a bigger turnout than the debut. The entry counts when the cards go in the air will tell the story.