Guaranteed tournaments are generally multi-table tournaments with more than 10 players. The guarantee means that there is a set prize pool, independently of how many competitors that have entered into the tournament. Guaranteed tournaments have a buy-in entry fee. Normally, the prize pool is set to an amount greater than the number of entrants and this ensures a bigger prize pool, even if there are only a few tables competing.

Some guaranteed tournaments have rebuys and add-ons, noted as R/A tournaments. This means that if you are eliminated (have lost all your chips) you can rebuy and enter the tournament again and keep on playing (for the same cost as the original buy-in). An add-on give the players with a low stack the chance to gain extra chips (usually the same amount and for the same cost as at the buy-in). Some tournaments have double add-ons which gives players twice the numbers of chips as the starting chip count but for the same cost as the buy-in.

A freezeout tournament does not have rebuys, so when you have lost all your chips you are eliminated from the tournament.