Which is Better: Online Poker or Live Poker?

7 years ago
Poker: Online vs. Live. Which is Better?
14:34
13 May

Poker is as popular as ever following the boom that came after Chris Moneymaker turned a $40 investment into millions. The following year every man and his dog had the dream of becoming the next world champ and thus the poker boom was born.

A byproduct of the poker boom was online poker, something that was met with a raise of the eyebrows initially, but is now fully accepted in today’s digital age. Essentially the games themselves are the same, but they can play very differently.

This article is going to look at some of the differences and point out some of the main advantages and disadvantages of both.


The Cost of Doing Business

Perhaps the biggest difference in live and online play is the costs involved. Playing live means traveling to a casino. The casino has many overheads which are passed onto the player, so you can expect high price rake and tournament entries and the stakes in general are much higher.

Online is the opposite. Once the software is paid for and the servers are in place, the poker site can spread as many games as they wish. This means uber small stakes games are available catering to players of all abilities and budgets.

Obviously playing online means you can play at home and do not need expenses to travel to the casino. Overall playing online is much friendlier to your pocket and schedule as you can play anytime of day provided there is a game going.


Extra Information - Tells

Poker is a game of information – incomplete information to be more specific – and the more information one has in a hand, the better a decision one can make. So what does that mean relative to live and online poker.

Well live poker is played face to face, so you get to look across at your opponent. Inexperienced players will often give off tells when they have a big hand and also when they are bluffing. This can be very easy to pick up on for the seasoned live professional, and is something that is absolutely not available to you in online poker.

On the flip side, this can be a disadvantage too. Shrewd players may give off false tells and feign strength or weakness to manipulate you into a certain play. Just the uncertainty of it all, in general, can prove more of a hindrance than help if you’re not very experienced.


Are There Tells in Online Poker?

The short answer is yes. Although the tells are much more subtle, some might say they are more reliable. The main tells in the online variant of the game are betting patterns. When playing live at a casino, chips can be complicated, players often don’t know exactly how much or little they are betting and it can be difficult to determine the size of the pot.

When playing online, everything is displayed as numbers on your screen, so you always know exactly how much you’re betting and exactly how much money is in the pot. This means that if a player deviates from his/her typical bet sizing there is usually a reason. Pay attention and you will soon figure out whether a player is betting big with their big hands or bluffs.


Crazy Pineapple Anyone?

If you are a poker fanboy like me, you are probably sick and tired of Texas Holdem and love to see all the wacky and crazy variants of poker available these days. Or else, perhaps you are a little old school and dream of playing Limit, Seven Card Stud, and Omaha like the good old days.

Casino’s have limited floor space and can only really spread the most popular variant of the game - Texas Holdem - No limit.

However, with online poker you can have as much space as you need! Most sites host numerous games at numerous stakes and they are very accessible, even for beginning players.


More Hands Per Hour

Anyone who knows poker knows it is a game with huge variance in the short term. That means that luck is a huge factor in results unless you play a bunch of hands. In live poker you are lucky if you get in 30 hands per hour, whereas online you can probably get at least triple that at one table.

That brings me onto the next point. Poker is a pretty slow and tedious game online; you don’t get to watch players faces or interact in between hands, so you’re often pretty bored. The online solution is multitabling. Many sites give you the opportunity to play multiple tables at once, which not only means you don’t get bored, but more importantly allows you to get in many more hands every hour, something that should increase your win rate if you know what you are doing. In other words you make more money.

Multi Tabling is not all good though. Playing a lot of tables means you miss out on a lot of that information we discussed earlier and can result in a very predictable and robotic playing style. If you are up against an observant player he/she will soon figure out what you’re up to and you will start wondering if they can see your cards!


Online Poker is Rigged!

OK, don’t read too much into that title. Online poker, for the most part, is certainly not rigged. Do a little research and you'll seethat the big company’s are making more $$ than I have numbers on my keyboard, so there is very little incentive for THEM to cheat you.

Having said that, there have been a number of instances in the past of cheating, scandals, and hacks where players have lost money through subversive means.

It should be said though, that there are as many instances if not more of players being cheated at the live tables too, so you should always have your wits about you live or online. Make sure you play in reputable casinos and on reputable poker sites to minimise your risks.


Bonuses

In business you are often rewarded for your loyalty and poker is no different, but this is perhaps the one area where online poker is vastly better than live poker.

In the casino you may get free food and drink while playing but that is about it. There are prop players who are employed by the casino to get games going that do much better, but to be honest these are very rare nowadays.

However, online poker offers some fantastic bonuses and incentives. When you join up with a site you’re almost always offered a deposit bonus where a site will usually match your initial deposit meaning you instantly double your bankroll.

On top of this, regular players are offered rakeback where they get a percentage of the money the site rakes from them back each month. Rake is a percentage of each pot or tournament buy in that you pay to the site for providing the games.

However the sites are now scaling back these rakeback deals and the lucrative 50% rakeback deals seem to be a thing of the past. They are still there, often disguised as VIP programs or similar, and they essentially offer the same thing as always - a portion of the money you pay the site returned, just not always in the form of cold hard cash anymore.


Live or Online?

So, should you play live or online? The answer is: it depends. Both offer advantages and disadvantages as we have outlined here. There is more to consider though. Each variant does require slightly different skill sets and suit certain individuals more than others.


Skills needed for online poker

  • High levels of concentration and the ability to multitask is a must as you will likely be using a HUD (heads up display), playing numerous tables, and sometimes even more than one form of poker.
  • Tilt Control - Being in control of your emotions is massive in online poker. Everything happens so quickly and five minutes of tilt can cost you your whole bankroll.
  • Fast Decision Making - Again, playing multiple tables and having a timer on every hand means you will have to analyze all of the data and make decisions at a rapid pace. If you can't you will likely get yourself in all kinds of difficult situations.


Skills needed for live poker

  • Attention to detail - Focusing on your opponents and picking up on their physical tells can be the difference between an amazing call or a terrible play.
  • Fighting boredom - Live poker is played at a tremendously slow pace compared with online and many players can play too loose and reckless because they’re tired of folding. Having the discipline to play your game during card dead periods is vital.
  • Game selection - Game selection is somewhat important online, but more so at the higher stakes. Live poker on the other hand usually has a very small player pool and sitting on somebody’s left or right could be the difference between a winning and losing session. Being able to identify this and willing to act on it is essential if you want to succeed at live poker.

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Sam is a freelance sports writer from the North East of England and Co-Host of weekly sports podcast, the IAWSportsCastHe is a lover of all sports and regularly tries and fails to beat the bookies.Read more

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