What advice can you recommend a beginner to online poker?

My advice: Don’t play online poker. I never trusted the integrity of and it is easier to become addicted. Just play live 2/4 Limit games. Maybe play a tournament. You’re play is going to continue to be up and down until you’re a real professional.

Not sure if this goes for online-poker as well, but some guys i see playing it on tv are wearing sunglasses.

Always hide an electronic ace up your elecronic sleeve.

You are going to lose. You might win once and it will feel great. But you will lose more and be compelled to do it more since that one win felt so great. If you have money to spend and are willing to play go for it.

That Internet company in the Bahamas is happy to take a large chunk of the money.

My advice is Friday night poker night with some friends if you like to gamble.

Can you stop recommending useless advice about not playing poker ._. I already realise the dangers involved with playing it and am not going to go mad with how much money I put in to playing it.

Just give me your money and I’ll tell you that you lost.

@Ame_Evil long time no see buddy, how are you? In answer to your question my advice would be to quit now. Gambling is a dangerous path to follow.

@Ame_Evil if you are determined to play, practice with your mates first playing for matchsticks and then when you play online do it when rich bored American housewives are likely to be playing while their husbands are at work, they are notoriously bad at it. I had a freind who gave up his job in a casino to play online poker full time. He was making about £40,000 a year tax free, but I think he was an exception as opposed to a rule.

Jesus! The original poster asked for advice in starting to play online poker. Not advice about whether or not to gamble.

I am an occasional gambler, as are several of my friends. We have never run into any problems with gambling, online or otherwise.

When we go to casinos, no one ever loses more than $100. If someone loses $100, no more gambling for him/her that night! But sometimes one of us will win $200—$500. And we always have a lot of fun. Gambling can be harmless, as long as you are responsible.

Outside of casinos, we sometimes play home poker games for $5—$10 a player. They always make for a great night. I haven’t gotten into online poker myself much, but some of my poker-playing friends have. They have played extensively, but mostly it’s just another outlet for fun. No one has ever really won or lost very much on online poker. My friends have sent me their playing stats. One is currently up about $750, according to his all-time playing record…and it goes back 12 years! He was never up or down more than $1000, total. Another recently one $400 in a tournament. These amounts of money are not very much to either one of them. It is simply something they enjoy doing. And they have never lost exorbitant amounts of money playing.

Since I have not played very much online poker, I do not have advice for you, but I just wanted to argue against everyone who was telling you not to play online poker! Just because there are some gambling nuts who can’t control themselves doesn’t mean that no one should gamble. Just like drinking, gambling can be a very safe and enjoyable recreational activity in moderation.

dont play!

Choose an amount of money you are willing to lose. Put that money into your account. Play. When it is gone. Quit. Don’t go back. It can be a monthly amount. Or weekly amount. Or an annual amount. But when it is done, so are you.

Beyond that, don’t play during or just after major holidays with gift giving traditions. That’s when the college kids who just got money from grandma and want to try their hand at poker play. People who play regularly know this and play more then to soak up the cash. You probably don’t want to get caught up in that. (I’m especially thinking of after Christmas).

Read a few books on playing poker online. There are some great ones out there.

Above all, don’t expect to win. You probably won’t. The money you put into it will be gone forever—it’s like a night out drinking. Gone fast, leaving you broke.

Ok can we stop with all the USELESS comments now. I only want to hear replies against people who actually have played or play online poker from now on.

I don’t think most of the folks playing poker online understand this: There are two ways to win a hand — showdown the best hand, or make them fold. If players check and call, they limit themselves to winning at showdown. But by betting and raising, they can fold. Put most simply, attack the pot.

The corollary to that is that it takes a much better hand to call a raise than to make a raise. I’m always surprised at how many players don’t get that one.

Never limp preflop.

Play fewer hands. There’s some weird psychology that gets wired into people from the very start. When someone says “hey, let’s go play some hands,” you never hear them say “hey, let’s go fold all the hands that aren’t good enough to play”, even though that’s a better suggestion.

Only play with money you won’t miss if you lose it. As soon as you think about whether you can afford to make the next raise, you’re not playing your best poker.

This was all very general advice. I’m sorry. Specific to online play, play a couple of different online poker rooms, because the client software varies, and one user interface you’ll like better than others. An old pro once told me to play at 3 or 4 p.m. Western time, because that coincides with all the drunk folks getting home in the East, but it seems there are folks getting home drunk all over the world whenever you play.

If you are new to this game then i would like to suggest you the basic things which you should keep in your mind before jumping into the competition.

- Do not play every hand – playing more doesn’t mean winning more, it usually means losing more
– do not bluff too much
– do not play drunk
– You need to have budget in your mind.

only play the hands that can win? Don’t play every hand while learning or anytime

Going to answer my own question here in case other people find this thread to find an answer.

Useful tips I found helpful:

- Know which hands to play, and how much to raise them.
– Pay attention to position. Position is everything and determines how much you raise and how you play each hand. It dictates the chance of someone having a better hand than you and also who bets first post flop.
– Read some books to gain techniques such as 3-betting, c-betting, floating etc. Learn when to use them properly, and not just whenever you want.
– Bluffing isn’t something you do when you feel like it, you can only do it when you have properly studied your opponent and know that he is most likely going to fold. No point bluffing a calling station.
– Don’t play when you are being distracted. You should pay 95% of your attention to the game. Sure you can play music to keep you entertained, but don’t try to juggle watching a movie or being in a room with friends who’ll distract you.
– Make use of site’s promotions.
– Tracking software is very helpful and really easy to get (You can get Hold ‘em Manager free from their site. Recommended: using FTP to get it as it only took me 1 day to get it for free on 10c/25c and playing during happy hours).
– Focus on the mathematics mostly, but be sure to know how to read opponents. Tracking software helps this.
– In general, the more tables the more mechanistic your actions. If you only play 1, you’ll generally be doing your best on that table. This does limit your profits somewhat, and more tables will mean you see more hands which means you don’t have to wait around so much for the top ones so you can play more tightly. Its best to find your own balance in order to keep playing to your best and the most profit. This can only be done with practise. You also have the best chance at improving your game swapping between playing one and many tables.
– Bad beats don’t mean you are a crap player. Tilting is bad, avoid it at all times. Even if it means taking a week off playing poker.
– Make sure to note important hand histories, and ask people (forums are good) whether what you did was a good play or not (even if you lost money). I recommend the 2+2 publishing forum.

More tips will come as I find them out or remember them.

Wish I could have gone back in time to tell me some of this. However some of it is quite obvious and YOU have to learn it yourself. Sometimes that involves taking some bad hits in the money area. But every time you do something stupid and lose a pot which you shouldn’t have (or shouldn’t have lost so much) you learn from that mistake (hopefully).