The defending champion was Thailand's Thepchaiya Un-Nooh, who defeated England's Michael Holt 74–0 in the 2019 final.

[2] The 2020 iteration is the 13th ranking event of the 2019–20 snooker season following the World Grand Prix and preceding the Players Championship.

The 2020 event had 128 participants from the World Snooker Tour and additional players were selected as wildcard entries.

The breakdown of prize money for this year is shown below: [12][13] The 2020 Snooker Shoot Out began on 20 February and the first round was played during the first two days.

[14][15] The tournament's opening match featured defending champion Thepchaiya Un-Nooh, who had defeated Michael Holt in the final of the 2019 event.

[18] Despite trailing 37–1 to Alfie Burden, Soheil Vahedi made a break of 36 to force a shootout, which he won.

[20] Three amateur players qualified for the second round of the competition; Scotland's Dean Young defeated David Grace 35–29[21] and Irish player Ross Bulman defeated 2018 Snooker Shoot Out winner Michael Georgiou 21–28.

[22] In an all-amateur first-round match, 15 year-old Robbie McGuigan was defeated 15–50 by European under-18 champion Aaron Hill.

[25] Nutcharut Wongharuthai played one shot in her match against Thor Chuan Leong,[21] who made a total clearance, scoring 133, the highest break of the event.

[21][26] Twelve-time women's world champion Reanne Evans also lost in the first round to Ian Burns.

[19] The 2019 Snooker Shoot Out runner-up Michael Holt played Amine Amiri, who had not won a frame on tour all season.

[30] All three amateur players won their second-round matches; Aaron Hill defeated world number eight Kyren Wilson with a break of 47,[31][29] Dean Young defeated Liam Highfield and Ross Bulman beat Andrew Pagett.

[15] Two top-16 players, Jack Lisowski and Barry Hawkins lost in the third round to Zhou Yuelong and Ben Woollaston respectively.

[32] Lyu Haotian made a half-century break before Soheil Vahedi needed a clearance to win the match; he missed a shot on the yellow ball and lost 47–64.