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Take quizPoker is a brutal game at times, and there is hardly a player out there who hasn’t felt some degree of injustice after suffering a massive bad beat or being on the receiving end of a cooler. While most people chalk such things to bad luck in the live poker environment, losing big pots to coolers and bad beats often stirs up the debate about online poker being rigged.
If you have played online poker for long enough, you have probably thought online poker is rigged at some point in your career, probably during a bad downswing you could not explain.
Whether online poker is rigged or not is not really up for debate as long as we are talking about regulated poker sites, but let’s talk about the evidence.
If you are still wondering if online poker is rigged and if there is something wrong with it, allow me to reassure you and provide some important things to consider regarding the fairness of the game.
When someone says online poker is rigged, they are usually referring to the random number generators (RNGs) that poker sites use, not being random at all.
In fact, we have heard the wildest theories on this topic, ranging from RNGs being rigged to favor players from specific countries to dealing cards in such ways that ensure the maximum rake or that the tournament will end as early as possible.
Of course, all of this nonsense was usually said by people who had lost a hand or a certain amount of money just recently and were still under the impression of the loss.
In reality, the RNGs used by online poker sites come as close to real randomness as possible, simulating random outcomes by running through millions of card combinations per second.
When all is said and done, every hand of online poker is completely random, and there is literally no way to predict what will happen or what cards may come in any given situation.
The most important thing to understand is that the RNGs used by major online poker operators, like GGPoker, PokerStars, or PartyPoker, are all vetted by multiple independent agencies, whose only job is to ensure the safety of such software being used online.
If you are still not buying it and still believe online poker is rigged, keep reading and find out even more reasons why it is not.
Every major online poker site in the world works under gaming licenses issued by major regulators such as the Malta Gaming Authority or the United Kingdom Gambling Commission. Such regulators make it their job to vet online gaming operators and ensure that their operations are in full accordance with the laws and that nothing is shady.
To receive an MGA or UKGC gaming license, an operator must undergo a series of tests and pass them all with flying colors.
There is no chance of an operator getting these gaming licenses if the RNGs are not 100% random or if there is any doubt about the operator’s intentions. In fact, even online poker sites operating under other gaming licenses generally provide a safe gaming atmosphere in terms of not being rigged and not cheating players out of their money in any way.
Yet, one of the key things I would recommend looking for in an online poker site is the license it works under and making sure only to play at properly licensed online poker rooms.
If you are an avid online poker player and have played enough hands of online poker, you can see that online poker is not rigged. All you need to do is save all your hands on your PC and use software like Hold’em Manager or PokerTracker to pull up all relevant data about your play.
You will be able to see just how often you have lost with aces, how many times the flush got there in big pots, or any other parameter you may think is rigged.
Once you have a big enough database, you will start to notice that every single scenario in online poker happens at exactly the frequency it is supposed to. Of course, don’t try to run such an analysis on a hand sample of a thousand hands of poker, as such a small sample will never yield correct results.
Keep going over your own hands or hands played by your friends, and you will see that there is nothing wrong with the RNG or the algorithms.
If you are still consistently losing at small stakes, you are probably not playing amazing poker or accounting for the extremely high rake in such games.
Another important thing to consider regarding whether online poker is rigged or not is the financial incentive that operators might have in “rigging” the games. As it stands now, running a major online poker room like GGPoker, PokerStars, or 888poker makes hundreds of millions a year for the companies behind these brands, and it has been like that for many years.
Poker sites that allowed shady things to happen in the past, such as UltimateBet or Full Tilt Poker, went out of business and likely lost billions in revenue.
Looking at it from the perspective of a modern-day online poker operator, the worst thing that could happen is for a scandal to break out with games actually being rigged. It is for this exact reason that operators invest a lot of money and hire a lot of people to ensure their sites are safe and fair in every way possible.
You might not want to believe it after you lose with a flopped set, but the games online are perfectly fair. You just didn’t run very well or misplayed a hand, which always happens.
Many conspiracy theorists believe that operators try to increase rake in cash games by setting up coolers all the time, but the truth is that there are just as many, if not more, cooler spots happening in live poker games all the time. On top of that, the rake is usually capped, so poker rooms do not earn more by making pots bigger.
Finally, you will also hear people talk about tournament hands being rigged, and with all players paying the exact same amount of rake, it would be hard to understand why any poker operator would want to do that.
Yet, regardless of all the evidence against it and the reasons for it not being true, plenty of people still believe online poker is rigged. For the most part, these recreational players play a very limited volume of online poker hands and want to win regardless of their skill level.
The truth is that poker is a very complex game with many aspects, and variance is one that all professional players understand all too well.
This is exactly why all pro players make sure they have massive bankrolls behind them, even though they play the game much higher than an average recreational player.
If you don’t believe you can lose with AA five times “in a row,” ask any mediocre mathematician how likely this is to happen, and they will explain to you that this is not even a statistical deviation.
The biggest reason anyone would think online poker is rigged is the small sample size. If you haven’t played enough hands of poker, you will often end up with seriously skewed data.
With that in mind, the internet will always be filled with trolls posting about online poker being rigged after playing 100 hands of cash games or a few tournaments, and there is probably nothing anyone can do about it.
I have never heard a winning poker player say online poker is rigged, and I don’t think it’s likely I ever will. Most people only talk about it being rigged after a big losing session or a bad beat in a tournament.
The fact that so many online poker players have made hundreds of thousands, or even millions of dollars playing the game, proves that the games are not rigged.
Poker is just a very hard game in which equities run much closer than you might like them to, and winning takes a lot of skill, discipline, and time.
If you want to become a true winner, you will need to learn how to manage your bankroll, play the game from the technical side, and not lose your cool when things are going badly.
Each of these skills comes with a number of sub-skills that you must master before you can win in poker at any significant level.
However, there are plenty of ways to learn all these skills and improve your game in each segment. Signing up for poker coaching is probably one of the best ones if that’s the kind of commitment you want to make.
In the end, if you are unwilling to put in the hours and become a true professional, there is nothing wrong with playing the game recreationally and enjoying yourself at the tables.
However, the next time you run into a series of bad beats, don’t blame the software or the company behind it, but simply accept that luck wasn’t on your side that particular night.
If you were only wondering if online poker is rigged, the firm and final answer is no, the game is not rigged, and countless pieces of evidence support that claim. However, this does not mean you are perfectly safe when you play online poker, as there are other things you need to be careful of.
The poker world was recently shaken by a scandal involving several high-stakes players using real-time assistance (RTA) while playing poker. RTA means using poker software to solve your hands while you are playing, which is banned at all major poker sites and is a form of cheating that some players use in modern times.
Furthermore, things like bots, ghosting, and hacking are all very real threats that you should be careful and vigilant about.
Some online poker sites are known to be infested by bots, which may not be the best poker players in the world but are very hard to beat as they try to play a straightforward game and cannot be worn down.
Players getting help from more experienced players in deep stages of tournaments is also a big danger that looms in online poker, and the practice of ghosting has been one that online poker operators have been trying to crack down on.
Finally, you will need to ensure that the devices you use to play online poker, especially at higher stakes, are secured and impervious to hacking attempts.
While online poker is not rigged in the real sense of the word, and the operators are not after extra rake money, you will still face some dangers as an online poker player. Throughout this article, we have discussed all the things you should be careful of and why online poker is not rigged.
So, in summary, make sure to always remember that variance is a massive part of poker, don’t raise any alarm bells over a few lost hands, and always try to play your hands better than you did in the past.
At the end of the day, also remember that poker is just a game, and there will be days when things don’t go your way. There is no reason to accuse anyone of anything or quit the game just because one session didn’t quite go your way.
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