Poker Bonuses vs. Rake

Many sites - most even - offer a bonus if you deposit money with them, most often as a percentage of how much you deposit. For instance, a site may offer a 50% initial deposit bonus up to $200, meaning that if you deposit $200 the bonus will come out to $100, and if you deposit $400, the bonus will have reached its maximum at $200. In case you think it sounds too good to be true, you're smart - it often is.

The catch - because of course there's a catch - is that you will not get the money instantly, but only after having played a certain number of hands, often a very large number of hands. The sites derive their income from the rake, or the small percentage of each pot that the house keeps, and the requirements in place for you to clear the bonus are calculated in a way that makes it virtually certain that you've paid more money in rake than the total of the bonus before you're done. This is not such an awful catch, though, because you will have to pay the rake either way - if you're clearing a bonus at the same time, you're getting at least some of the money back.

Clearing bonuses is a very good way for beginning players to build bankrolls, if they're already skilled enough, or at least to break even if they're still learning. The trick lies in finding a bonus that is suitable for how much you're willing to deposit, while simultaneously being something you can realistically clear. If you deposit at a site for the specific purpose of clearing their bonus, make sure you understand the terms and conditions for the requirements in order to receive your bonus. Pay specific attention to how generous the requirements are in relation to the sort of games you play. Some sites give virtually no credit for SnG or tournaments at all, for instance, and some require you to play at $1/$2 limits or above. Find out what the rules are before you deposit, and as always: Make sure you make good use of their customer service. If you email them requesting information about depositing, you'll hopefully find that they're helpful.

Some sites do not offer bonuses, though, most notably PokerStars. They, PokerStars, do offer periodical reload bonuses, but they do not (at the time of writing) have any initial deposit bonuses. This does make them slightly less attractive to short term bonus hunters (often referred to as bonus whores), but they instead have lower rakes to make up for it. It's not certain that their slightly lower rakes will benefit you, however, as it may not be noticable at the limits you play. As a rule of thumb, the rake matters the most at low (but not micro) limit games. This is also something that you would do well to look into before depositing at a new site: How high is their rake? Despite offering a huge deposit bonus, you may find that their rake is so high that you're actually better off playing at a site with a seemingly worse bonus (or no bonus at all), but with better rake. As mentioned before, you should of course also look into whether or not this particular site offers limits that you're comfortable playing at all, and should also find out if the tables for these limits are ever populated. Some low-population sites may offer exactly the limits you want to play - you just won't have anyone to play against.

With bonuses, as with depositing and cash outs, doing your homework before committing can save you a lot of headaches later on. Cardschat has a range of poker bonuses up to $600.