When Is it Time to Move Up Stakes?

The answer to this question can be as complicated as we decide to make it. Conversely, we can take a simple approach as well. Let's take a look at what factors we need to be aware of when deciding if we should move up from our current stakes.

If you're a casual player with little experience, trying to work this all out for yourself might be quite a daunting prospect. A hour or so of doing some research will leave you feeling bombarded by concepts such as 'bankroll management', 'win rate', 'risk tolerance' and 'shot taking'.

You thought it was okay to just move up when you felt like it, right? Don't be so hasty, there's more than a few tips and tricks to help you along your way.

First, it's important to realise that there is no definitive answer to all of this. “It depends,” will be the most common reply to any detailed questions you might have, and you know yourself better than anyone so don't forget your gut instinct.

Proper Bankroll Management

Before any decisions can be made, we must know exactly how much money is in our bankroll. This consists of any money already in our accounts online, plus what we are willing to deposit at a later date. This looks ridiculously obvious, but for the purpose of keeping to some kind of scientific method, we should decide upon a fixed sum of money, and stick to it!

Keep your poker money, and your day to day money separate! Trust me, this will make some decisions later on a lot easier. It will also help you keep your mind set in tip top condition. Do you really want to be considering a shot at higher stakes with next month's food budget? I didn't think so. But there's always one, isn't there?

Now, once we know how much we have to play with, we need to decide what level of risk we are comfortable with. This is very much a personal detail. It depends on your willingness to re-deposit, and start all over again if you bust all of your starting bankroll using an aggressive strategy.

There is a wide spectrum of acceptable strategies, don't be afraid to change things around as you see fit if you want a more conservative approach or feel up for something a little riskier.

The Average Player

For online cash game players, the average bankroll size is going to be around 40 buy-ins, with a buy-in being 100 big blinds.

The conservative approach here, will be around 50 to 60 buy-ins, with the risk takers happy to go with as little as 20 buy-ins.

In case those statements don't make sense, what they mean is that you should take your whole bankroll and divide it by that number. What you get should be your buy-in level so you can buy in 40, 50, or 20 times.

This is just a starting point for when we can take shots. It gets more complicated when we make a decision on maybe withdrawing a part of the bankroll. And if things start to go south a little, when will we accept that dropping back down is the best course of action?

Many old timers will say these recommendations are too conservative, but the games from the top to the bottom of the stakes ladder are getting a lot tougher each year. With rates are falling. The amount of variance we experience is mathematically tied to our win rate. With even the smallest stakes available being much harder to beat than not too long before, everybody who plays cash games today is exposed to an insane amount of variance. The golden age is long gone.

As an example, around four years ago, playing one of the smallest stakes full ring Zoom games over a large sample, I went through three 20 buy-in downswings with a win rate pushing 10bb/100. If you're only winning 1-2bb/100, in a 6-Max game, you're going to be on a roller coaster like no other. This is not what casual players are going to want to hear, but I'm afraid a reality check is in order if you want to start doing things properly from now on.

For multi table tournament players, the standard advice has moved from 100 buy-insup to 300over the last 10 years. It is important that even though you might be keeping your average buy-in within your target, that you don't take too many higher buy-in shots. A maximum two percent of your entire bankroll for each shot above your normal level is common advice.

Tournament are a totally different beast from cash games, and are not really suitable for trying to earn a day to day living because they have the worst variance across all poker games. For this reason you might consider using an aggressive strategy of 200 buy-ins, taking shots for a big score, while playing another variant for a more steady profit.

Moving On Up

I suggested above that 20 buy-ins would be an acceptable lower end for players willing to take a high risk of ruin. If you are a new player, or aware that you are still only a small winner for your stakes, then you should be aware that a 20 buy-in downswing today is absolutely nothing compared to what will happen sooner or later. You shouldn't feel put off in any way by this, just be mentally prepared for when it happens, and don't feel that it's any kind of failure.

When you do decide to take some shots, I recommend that the first couple of times you set a five buy-in stop loss. You need to forget any ideas about smoothly moving up the ladder, one stake after the other. There will be catastrophes, it's unavoidable.

Remember, it's not compulsory in any way to be playing as high as you're rolled for. The idea is to treat each shot as a learning exercise. If things go really well, and you run hot, then you might become established during your first attempt, but most often you are going to be bouncing up and down a few times before it finally clicks into place. If things get off to a bad start, take all the time you need at your usual stakes to get your confidence back.

Once you are into the swing of things, and have more experience, then you can extend your shots to as much as 10 buy-ins.The only downside to this is that if the shot fails, your recovery period will double.

The more aggressive approach is really only suited to already proven solid players. For everybody else it would be wise to be more measured. This has the advantage of giving you more time to develop as a player instead of arriving at too high a level before you're ready for it. With some good runs it's possible you could maintain those stakes for a while before the disaster comes, the end result being more lost time than what could have been the case.

Common Pitfalls

For a system that sounds incredibly simple, the amount of mistakes I hear from people trying to follow it is unreal.

Number one has to be jumping up to the next stakes in order to recoup losses. This is crazy behaviour, that will almost certainly lead to losing a big chunk of your precious bankroll. There's no excuse for this one.

Trying to change too many parts of your game after moving up is a common error as well. Many players mistakenly believe that the jump will see them facing players with a large skill advantage. This is an exaggerated version of the truth, obviously the players will be better on average, but the difference is never as much as people expect. Don't over compensate when you find yourself in familiar spots. What I see most from beginners, is the belief that suddenly they feel they are being bluffed at every opportunity. Paranoia sets in pretty quickly. Don't let yourself fall for this one.

Nor should you feel the need to set your stall out as a player who will not be pushed around, but is going to be doing the pushing. It's one thing to start hero calling when you feel you might be getting bluffed more often, but quite another to start monkey raising post flop. Its a disaster waiting to happen. It's the same game, with exactly the same player types, just the regs are slightly better. Don't try and take on a new persona.

Table selection takes on an increased importance during your shot taking. Making sure that you're playing under the best possible conditions gives you a better chance of success. Weekend poker is noticeably softer than during the week. Seek out the weak players, and think about cutting how many tables you play so you can exploit them to the best of your abilities.

Finally, I don't know how many more times I am going to hear about a player who took a shot, and then didn't have the discipline to move back down after it turned sour. Your mental game is going to be in bad shape after this, and the chances of you putting everything straight are a lot lower than you think.

Final Thoughts

So the answer to the question in the title, is simply, when you have enough buy-ins. But I hope now that the casual players reading will understand that there's more than just a few factors which need paying attention to, to give yourself the best chance of success. There's plenty of things that could go wrong with your preparation.

One additional factor which sticks out in my mind is confidence. Poker players seem to be prone to imagining all kinds of things about how everything is conspiring against them. This gets much worse when our confidence is low. If you're worrying that maybe you achieved your bankroll target by running super hot, then make sure that you don't move up until you're totally confident that you're a confirmed winner at your usual stakes. Avoid putting yourself under unnecessary pressure, it's extremely counter productive.

The final word has to go to variance. People need to be told this time and time again. It is not 2005 any longer, we're playing in a much tougher environment now, and the swings are just a standard part of poker life. Don't feel that you're failing in anyway by having to repeatedly attack the same stake level and then move back down. Even the very best players would be going through the same strife if they had to start all over again. It's not only you that has this struggle.