Online Poker > Poker Sites > Comparing the Best Poker Sites

How to Compare Poker Sites

Some poker sites are better than others -- that's a fact. And you don't want to get stuck playing at one of the bad ones. It's no fun having to deal with poor software, a lack of games, or a tapped-out pool of fish. Thus you should know how to compare poker sites before you make a deposit. Picking the best poker site is, to a degree, a subjective process. You'll certainly have to decide what features you value, and weigh your decision accordingly. But in order to do that properly, you need to know all the variables involved.

This page outlines some of the key requirements poker sites should have to make them a "good site". Only the poker rooms that have met the criteria outlined below are listed and new players joining these rooms receive exlusive bonuses from our site.

Comparing Online Poker Rooms

Rank	Poker Room	Bonus	Match	Code	Player Trafic	Room Review
1	888 Poker	$/£600	100%	N/A	30,000+	888 Poker
2	BetOnline Poker	Instant	25%	N/A	6,000+	BetOnline Poker
3	Lock Poker	$750	150%	N/A	8,000+	Lock Poker
4	Bovada Poker	$1100	110%	N/A	5,000+	Bovada Poker
5	Party Poker	$/£500	100%	NETPOKER500	50,000+	Party Poker
6	BWIN Poker	£500 / €500	100%	N/A	22,000+	Bwin Poker
7	Cake Poker	$600	110%	OPCAKE	5,000+	Cake Poker
8	Winner Poker	$2000	250%	OPNET	20,000+	Winner Poker

Comparing The Top Internet Poker Sites

888 Poker Innovative Software - Play Poker Online Live With Your WebCam

Receive a 100% up to $600 Bonus + $8 Free Cash Bonus

USA Players Are Not Accepted

888 Poker is an industry leader when it comes to creating a software platform fit for any type of player. The poker room offers 3D like graphics, customized backdrops and was the first to introduce online poker via a web cam. 888 offers micro to high limit cash games as well as variety of tournaments in Hold’em, Omaha, Stud, Draw and attracts just over 50,000 players during peak hours. Unfortunately, this poker room does not accept USA players. Join 888 Poker here and receive a free $8 no deposit bonus PLUS an extra 100% to $600 when you make your first deposit.

BetOnline.com Instant Deposit Bonus On All Poker Deposits

25% Bonus on All Deposits + Accepts USA Deposits

Accepts USA Players

Bet Online is by far the largest growing poker room that accepts USA players. The site provides one of the best bonuses around. Join BetOnline.com through our site and be grandfathered into the 25% instant cash bonus. This bonus is capped at $900 and is available on all deposits. The poker room is incredibly fishy, offers an online casino and US friendly sportsbook. They feature Hold’em and Omaha games running non-stop throughout the day. The download is available for Mac and Windows players. Bet Online has no problems accepting US players and currently has the best processing rate for deposits with Visa, Mastercard and Amex.

Lock Poker Offers One of the Best Poker Software Clients

Offering a huge 150% to $750 Deposit Bonus

Accepts USA Players

Lock Poker is part of the Merge Gaming Network and next to 888 also has one of the best poker software in the industry. Whether you’re a recreational player or seasoned vet, there are plenty of options at this site to keep your game flowing smooth. This includes reizable tables, custom multi-tabling options, advanced tagging, custom tournament statistics and more. The poker room is notorious for it’s easy to beat cash games and overlays. They offer one of the largest spreads of games, catering to Hold’em, Omaha, Razz, HORSE, Stud, Draw and Badugi players. Join LockPoker.com through our site and receive a special 150% to $750 bonus.

Bovada Poker - Biggest Overlays Online - Huge Promotions

Receive a 110% up to $1100 on Your First Deposit (Includes up to $100 in Cash)

Accepts USA Players

Bovada Poker has continued to provide players with some of the best tournaments online. The poker room holds the record for supporting the largest tournament overlay, peaking at just $53,000 and provides some unique promotions giving you the opportunity to win a package to any live tournament on the circuit. Bovada features an easy to use poker client, which supports Hold’em, Omaha, and Draw poker. The cash games here are where it’s at. The poker room draws in more casino and sports book players than any other site, which is why you’ll find the games here a bit softer than some of the other rooms on this list. Join Bovada here and receive a 100% to $1000 poker bonus, plus an extra 10% to $100 instant bonus.

Party Poker Offers Bad Beat Jackpot - Instant Bonuses for VIP Members

Receive a 100% up to $500 on Your First Deposit
Must Use Our Bonus Code NETPOKER500

USA Players Are Not Accepted

Party Poker is another comparable site to 888 Poker. The poker room continuously delivers some of the best features and tournaments for players. Party Poker is the largest European / Canadian poker room, catering to over 60,000 players during peak hours. PartyPoker.com’s software is fast, ground-breaking and is free of any bugs or glitches. It offers a progressive bad beat jackpot, loads of functions including the ability to chop pots. The tournament line-up offers regular guarantees, freezeouts, freerolls and rebuy tournaments in addition to a monthly $1,000,000 guarantee and step tournaments. Join Party Poker using our bonus code NETPOKER500 and receive a 100% to $500 bonus with your first deposit.

BWIN Poker Is Offering Tickets To Major Sporting Events in Europe

Offering a huge 100% to £500 Exclusive Sign Up Bonus

USA Players Are Not Accepted

If you’re looking for a poker room with fast software, great promotions and friendly support, Bwin Poker is it. The poker room is the largest poker site on the OnGame Network, was the first to offer a native Mac client and features a huge array of tournaments scheduled 24/7. The OnGame software is completely unique in comparison to the other rooms on this list and features 3D like avatars, a custom tournament chat room and the ability to request private tournaments for you and your friends. Bwin is an official sponsor for some of the biggest sporting events across Europe, and as a Bwin player you can win seats to these events as well as live tournaments via the VIP rewards program. Sign up today and receive an exclusive 100% to $500 bonus.

Cake Poker - One of the Best Rewards Program With Cash Value

Receive a 110% up to $600 on Your First Deposit

Accepts USA Players

Cake Poker is another great option when your comparing poker sites. This poker room accepts USA players, launched in 2006 and has an excellent history with players. The poker room is the flagship site under the Cake Network and recently upgraded their software to include better multi-tabling features, customized avatars and better speed. The most notable feature with Cake Poker is the unique rewards program. There’s two here, whereby players can win Gold Cards (these have a cash value) and Gold Chip. Redeem either of these items in the online store or use them to enter into special tournaments. Overall, Cake is a great site for US players and they offer a 110% to $600 bonus.

Winner Poker Offers Mac / Windows Software - Play Poker in Euros/Pounds/ Dollars

Receive a 100% up to $500 on Your First Deposit
Must Use Our Winner Poker Coupon Code OPNET

USA Players Are Not Accepted

Winner Poker is the final poker site on our “compare poker rooms” list. This poker room is backed by the popular iPoker Network and has more options and features built into their software then you will ever be able to use. The poker room offers excellent filter options to speed up game selection. They support tables in multiple currencies and they offer a flash version of their poker room for Mac players. One of the nice aspects of this site is that they allow you to stack a bonus which means you can take advantage of additional bonus offers while clearing another. Currently, the poker room is offering a 250% to $2000 bonus when you join using the coupon code TOPBONUS.

The Main Differences Between Poker Sites

The differences between poker sites can be subtle. After all, poker is a pretty standardized game. So what you need to look at is how well or how poorly certain rooms implement certain features. I've found there to be roughly four main features you'll want to compare across poker sites: software quality, value of promotional offers, variety of games spread, and fish-to-regular ratio. To help you compare poker sites, I want to go over both the subjective and objective aspects you should consider in each category.

Compare Poker Sites by Software

Probably the biggest differences between poker sites have to do with software quality. Some rooms are way ahead of the pack in terms of usability and stability, and others are more advanced in terms of special features and graphics. In the end, it all comes down to what you value in a poker client.

Consider how fast a poker client runs on your computer, and how responsive the client is to your actions at the table. Some poker rooms have poorly-coded software marred by latency and sticky buttons. This could be a big problem for you if you're a multi-tabler, or if you're just impatient.

Make sure a poker client has all the standard game-enhancing features. These include a four-color deck, an auto-rebuy option, and multi-tabling tools like resizable tables that can be arranged easily. Also consider that some poker rooms go way above and beyond in terms of extras. For example, 888 poker has just introduced 'PokerCam' tables, at which you can set your avatar to be a live webcam feed rather than a static picture. A feature like this can sway your decision, depending on what you're looking for.

Make sure that a site's poker software is compatible with your computer. If you're running a PC with Windows installed, don't worry about this -- you're good. But if you're a Mac or Linux user, make sure a prospective poker room has a Mac- or Linux-compatible client. Often these will be web-based Flash clients. But some rooms like Lock Poker and Party Poker do offer native MacOS clients. If you don't like playing on a web-based client, this could sway your decision.

Compare Poker Sites by Promotional Offers

Do you like free money? If so, make sure you compare bonuses and promotional offers across poker sites.

A common form of bonus in the poker industry is the first deposit bonus. This type of bonus rewards you for choosing a poker room by giving you free money upon your first deposit. The amount of money you can receive depends on how much you load in. Generally, you'll be offered anywhere from 50% to 200% of the value of your deposit. Obviously, the higher this percentage, the more free money you get. Look out for the best first-deposit bonuses when you compare poker sites.

Another popular form of bonus is the reload bonus. This type of bonus rewards you for making a deposit above and beyond your first one. Generally a poker room will run reload bonuses temporarily over short periods of time; so you'll want to know how often, if ever, the poker room you're considering does this. Reload bonuses can be a great source of extra income if you play a lot of poker.

Poker rooms also run special value-added promotions as incentives for players to stick around. These come in the form of freeroll tournaments, VIP schemes, and landmark competitions. 888 Poker, for example, runs a bunch of first-depositor freerolls that only newbies may play. These freerolls give you a shot at padding your bankroll, with no investment required. Another example of a good promotion is Lock Poker's Bad Beat Jackpot: just play at the BBJ tables, take a bad beat, and you could potentially win a 6-figure score.

Compare Poker Sites by Games Spread

Some poker rooms have more traffic than others. As a general rule, poker sites with high traffic spread a greater variety of poker games. So if you're into playing lesser-known forms of poker, you will probably be better off at a high-traffic room.

For example, say you like playing Seven Card Stud. Most sites have Stud tables. But very few have a decent-sized pool of Stud players. So if you pick a site too hastily, you might end up sitting in at empty tables. A site like Party Poker is great for Stud players because there's enough traffic to keep games going all the time. Other sites might not have enough traffic to run Stud except at peak hours. Make sure you compare poker sites in this respect before diving into play.

Compare Poker Sites by Fish-to-Regular Ratio

It's kinda tough to figure out which sites have soft tables and which sites have tough tables before you actually play on them. What you might want to do is open up a poker room's software before you deposit, and watch the games for a little while. Most poker rooms will allow you to do this.

Watch the tables for five or ten minutes. This is enough time to get a general feel for the player pool. If you see tables mainly full of nitty or aggressive players, chances are these tables are a good representation of the site as a whole. If you see lots of weak, passive play at the tables, chances are you've found a goldmine.

How to Compare Poker Sites

Comparing Online Poker Rooms

Comparing The Top Internet Poker Sites

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Top Poker Rooms