Top 10 Tips

Our top 10 tips for winning at online poker is a bite sized overview of the how to improve your EV. For those that aren’t aware, EV stands for expected value and this is the only thing that really matters when it comes to online poker in the US.

Of course, we all know that dollars and the size of your bankroll are crucial, but when it comes to improving your game it’s EV that matters. In fact, if you’re able to improve your skills and, thus, your EV, then it will naturally follow that you bankroll moves in an positive direction.

In a nutshell, EV is a forward-facing attitude. Each move at the poker table has an expected value which can either be positive or negative. As a player, it’s your job to make the most +EV move in all situations. If you can achieve this feat then it doesn’t matter whether you make money in the hand or not, because over time that same move will yield a long-term profit.

This thought process is the same when it comes to your own skills. By reading our top 10 tips for beating online poker, you’ll be adding vital points to your personal EV which means you’ll have more chance of making money in the long run.

So, now that we’ve outlined how you need to think and why it matters, let’s take a look at our top strategy tips for online poker players in the US:

1. Building a Bankroll Managing your money is arguably the most important poker strategy tip we can offer. Defining how much money you have to play with will influence almost every decision you make at the poker table. In basic terms, your poker bankroll should be an amount of money you can comfortably afford to lose. By defining it in this way you allow yourself to play without fear and with freedom because it doesn’t matter if you win or lose, the cash flow shouldn’t affect your life. Once you’ve outlined how much money you’re able to play with, you can then define the parameters within which you can play.

2. Managing Your Bankroll After you’ve formed your bankroll, the best way to nurture it is by sticking to certain limits. One of the best online poker tips we can offer you is to never put more than 5 percent of your bankroll at stake in a single game. For example, let’s assume your bankroll is $1,000 and you want to play 6-max NLHE cash games on our top US poker sites. In this situation you shouldn’t play stakes any higher than $0.25/$0.50. The reason for this is that online poker can be extremely volatile and it’s easy to lose a buy-in even if you play perfectly. In practice, a buffer of 20 buy-ins should be sufficient for many low stakes games in the US.

3. Learn how to Beat Tilt If you can’t control your emotions at the table then our top 10 tips for winning at poker are basically useless. Going on tilt basically means that you lose control of your emotions and play like an idiot. Because of the hierarchical nature of the brain, your rational decision-making process becomes blocked when you get too emotional. This means you need to take regular breaks, play within your limits and generally try anything you can to stay calm while you’re at the table.

To increase your chances of winning massive cash pots and tournaments, take measures to improve your expected value when playing at your online poker room

4. Play Free Online Poker Games Before you can run you need to learn how to walk and there’s no better proving ground in the US poker world than play money games. In order to make full use of our top 10 poker tips, we recommend playing as many free games as possible. All our top US poker sites will have free games and you can use this arena to hone your skills before you put your own money on the line.

5. Poker Game Selection If you’re the tenth best poker player in the US, but decided to sit down with the nine players who were better than you, it’s very likely you’d lose your bankroll. Online poker is all about table selection and that means finding players that are less skilled that you are. Of course, everyone wants to prove themselves, but as we’ve already mentioned, poker is all about improving your EV and making money. One of the best ways to improve your EV is by looking at table where the pre-flop raise percentage is low and the number of players limping in is high.

6. Play Poker Freerolls In addition to playing for virtual poker chips, online poker freerolls are another way to improve your skills and the size of your bankroll. These tournaments don’t cost anything to enter and usually have top prizes topping $100. This cash is free and can either be withdrawn or used to play real money games.

7. Top Poker Books To develop an in-depth knowledge about the skills needed to become a well-rounded poker player you need to read some of the best poker books available. While our top 10 tips for becoming a winning poker player will certainly give you a solid foundation to build on, you won’t be able to mix it with the best players in the USA without reading classics such as Doyle Brunson’s Super System or David Sklansky’s Theory of Poker.

8. Top Poker YouTube Videos Another way to become a top poker player is by watching YouTube videos. Although you won’t find premium content freely available, a number of well-renowned players, such as Jason Somerville, regularly put out poker strategy content via YouTube as part of their sponsorship deals with some of the top US poker sites.

9. Study other players at the table Observing players is one of the top skills an online poker player can hone. In order to make a profit at any US poker site you need to be reactive. That means you need to watch what players are doing and do the opposite. If they are aggressive then play more cautiously. If everyone is playing tight then up your aggression levels. This constant ebb and flow is only possible if you study the players at your table.

10. Be Flexible In order to move with the dynamics of the table you need to learn a range of styles. All players will have a default strategy, but if you want to mix it up with the likes of Phil Ivey and Daniel Negreanu, you need to have a wide range of tools in your repertoire.

Becoming a world-class poker player takes time, dedication and patience. Our list of top 10 poker tips should provide a fantastic baseline from which to work from, but if you really want to improve your EV you need to put these skills into practice at our top US poker rooms.

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