Are Online Poker Sites rigged or not?

December 1, 2009 · Posted in Online poker rooms 

No matter which online poker sites you play poker at, there will be players who (for some reason or another) claim that the poker site they currently play on is rigged, biased or is cheating.

Oftentimes you will hear stories about online poker sites being rigged from players who have just had a nasty badbeat or are perhaps experiencing a bad downswing. This can best be described, if I just give you an example.

For instance, you are holding KK and at the same time someone has AA. Of course, in situation like this chips will be flying all over the table as both of you have monster hand are more than willing to commit whole stacks pre-flop.

But as soon as you see your opponents, you realise how big of an underdog you are. The only two cards that can save your ass from busting out are the 2 remaining Kings.

The chances of hitting one of the Kings by the river and winning the hand are therefore very slim. To be more specific, you have around 18 % chance of winning with KK when some else holds an AA.

But despite being in such a bad spot (or shape perhaps), in the long run you will still win 18 hands out of 100 when holding KK versus AA. Now lets say that the above mentioned situation is one of those 18 hands, which means you hit your King on the river and win the hand.

This makes a player with AA very upset as he just lost the best (pre-flop) hand possible and claims that the online poker site is rigged. Of course, we can not blame him for saying that as it really sucks to lose Aces against Kings, especially on the river.

Never the less, you must know that such badbeats happen. Not because online poker sites are rigged, but simply because the mathematics and probability in poker. Every poker player that plays either online or live poker on regular basis will sooner or later came across situations like that.

You are bound to come across situations where your Aces will lose against Kings, if you play poker. That is just part of the game. So do not let it get to you, when it happens. Just get back on your horse and keep on grinding because in the long run you will still have big profit from hands like AA.

In case you are interested in how online poker sites take care of NOT being rigged, well, they do it by using software with so called Random Number Generators and Pseudo-Random Number Generators. Visit this poker blog for more information on the above generators.

Of course, there can still be online poker rooms out there who actually are rigged, but I believe they will get caught sooner or later. Therefore, do not worry whether the online poker room you play at is rigged or not.

Instead, rather focus your attention on the poker game itself and learn from the mistakes you make!

Good luck at the tables and do not let the badbeats and downswings get the best of you. Until next time, have fun and good luck at the tables!

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Comments

  • Ramelpr
    Obviously the person that wrote this article doesn't play online poker on a daily bases. Yes, there are bad beats in poker. Yes, you do see more hands online then in live poker. However, that does not change the fact that an overwhelming amount of bad beats happen when they are not likely to happen. Do your own research. Write down every preflop all in hand that you see and ask yourself, who was the favor? Now ask yourself, how many times the favor won and who was the low stack?

    When it happens on a REGULAR bases then it's not coincidence. It's not everyone's imagination. Why do people always say that? No, it doesn't mean your a bad player, it just means you don't recognize the patterns like some of the other people. That's why you see all in calls with dumb hands 6 hours into the tourny, with thousands of dollars on the line. How did they get that far in the tourny if they don't know how to play? And if they do know how to play, why would they risk their tourny on marginal hands like 33 calling AA preflop all in?

    People don't listen to these fake non-playing online supporters. They will have you thinking that you played your AA wrong when you know that you raised half of your stack preflop to get the marginal hands to fold. They will have you thinking 8 badbeats in a row to 3 outs and less is normal. Go with your gut! And YES, I have won playing online poker and cashed out plenty of times to pay bills. I have been playing for 4 years and I still think there is something wrong with the SNG. My theory is the game is designed to end as quickly as possible, so the company can save money. The longer a game is, the more money it costs the company.
  • Well, I wrote this article my self and I have been playing online poker on regular basis (daily for at least 3 hours) for 3 years before I quit - to focus solely on my career.

    What you are saying may be right (I do not deny it), but until online poker rooms are PROVEN to cheat with SNGs (favoring big stacks over small stacks), all we have is different opinions - once (if) there are scientific (statistical) studies that prove the cheating, then we can discuss who was wrong and who was right into more details.

    Until then, I am confident to believe that poker rooms exposed on scatmann.net (Full Tilt, PokerStars and LuckyAce Poker) are not rigged.

    Thanks for dropping by and leaving a comment! Cheers : )
  • That is an interesting theory. I first heard it from my brother who was basically saying the same thing you two have pointed out: Shortstacks lose against big stacks at online poker tournaments.

    While I hope this is not true, I have no idea what the truth really is.
  • kazoo37
    I say several are rigged not due to any of the 'theories' stated above. With clarity I say this because I watch many hands daily where the person with the largest stack wins above 80% of their hands reguardless of thier hole cards. For example one hand had 4 all ins just today. The cards were 1)AK, 2)A,Js 3) A,10o and 4th (the large stack) 3,6o. There was all low cards on the streets other than one J. GUESS WHAT the Large stack got FH 6's over threes. VERY NEXT HAND there are three callers for an all in. 1) AA 2)AK and the high stack again with 2,9. GUESS WHAT AGAIN the 2,9 wins with nothing hitting the board and gets yet another FH with BOTH hole cards. I see this repeatedly daily and have taken advantage of it myself. WITH THE HIGH STACK I win 'all in's' a huge majority of the time regardless of an insane push with NOTHING.
  • Ps104
    so true. I knew a software enginneer years ago who was working on the poker software. He said that tournament software is designed to eliminate short stacks so they can get more rake in(enter new tourneys when ko'ed). I play the same as you when i have a big stack. I never take on bigger stacks, because you will 70 - 80% of the time. if people do not beleave us, try it for your self.
  • Ps104
    lose 70 - 08% of the time
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