I would begin with one of the major sites: Party Poker, Poker Stars, Ultimate Bet, Poker Room, Paradise Poker, Empire Poker.  All of these sites have been around for years, so they're the "safest" choices in the online poker industry.  [Note: As of October 2006, many of these sites have stopped accepting real-money players from the U.S.]  Download the software from one of these sites (go to Where to Play).  Open a play money account and test drive the interface.  Are there freeroll tournaments that you can enter without depositing money?  Playing these freerolls is a good way to get your feet wet without any risk to your bankroll.  Next, decide what level you'll want to play once you do deposit real money.  Let's say you want to play $1/$2 limit hold'em.  Is there a sufficient number of $1/$2 tables during the time of day that you're most likely to play (you want at least two tables, but four or more is what you want to see)?  You can easily get this information from the "lobby" (main screen) of the poker software client.  Some sites, such as Pacific Poker and Gaming Club, aggressively market in Europe, so these sites will often have people playing at off-hours in the U.S.

It's important to find a site where you feel comfortable playing; there's no reason to stick with a site because it is the first one you joined.  Some sites will offer more or better tournaments than others, while some will have the most fish in cash games.  Four sites get about 90% of my play: Party Poker, Poker Room, Poker Stars, and Interpoker (in that order).  Whenever I play cash games, I usually play where I will be earning credit toward a redeposit bonus.  These four sites offer frequent (usually one a month) redeposit bonuses, but there are others that do too.  The rest of my play is divided among Empire Poker, Paradise Poker, and Ultimate Bet.  If I play ten hours a week, I've found that I can always play at a site that earns me credit toward a redeposit bonus.  For me, the critical mass of poker sites is six or seven; even when I have more than ten hours a week to play, having six or seven sites to choose from guarantees that I'll always be earning credit toward a redeposit bonus.  Thus, there's no compelling reason for me to join a new site unless it offers a promotion that really interests me, but how many sites you join will depend on how much you play and how important bonuses are to you.

Where you start will depend on your "bankroll," your tolerance for risk, and your reason for playing.  A very conservative rule of thumb is that your bankroll should be able to cover 300 big bets (BB).  So, if you want to play $2/$4 limit hold'em, a bankroll of $1,200 will be more than enough.  Many believe that 200BB is plenty, but anything less than 100BB is not sufficient.  An adequately-sized bankroll will help you to weather the "swings" that your play will inevitably take.  It's not uncommon to lose 30BB during one two-hour session of play, even if you have been playing tight.  If you are just beginning and losing $50 in a day would really bother you, I suggest playing $0.50/$1.00 but nothing lower than that.

The choice you make will depend on your style of play and tolerance for risk.  I think that a beginner has a better chance to be profitable playing limit hold'em (LHE) versus pot limit hold'em (PLHE) or no limit hold'em (NLHE).  This is because there is a generally right way to play your hands in LHE that maximizes your profit potential and limits your risk.  All of this goes out the door in NLHE and some PLHE games.  You can lose your entire stack at any moment.  It's my feeling that as a solid beginner, you are at a much bigger disadvantage in a NLHE game against strong players than you are in a LHE game against strong players.  Still, for some people, the excitement of no limit action is the reason they play poker, so don't play a certain kind of game if you are not enjoying yourself.

When I play in cash games, I play a combination of all three types of hold'em.  Right now, I play mostly $3/$6 LHE and $50 NLHE.  The $50 before NLHE means that the maximum initial buy-in at the table is $50.  The blinds are $0.25 and $0.50 (cheap!).  If your stack falls below $50, you may replenish your stack up to $50 but no more.  However, if you win a few hands and your stack grows larger than $50 (say, $85), you may wager up to that amount.  So, while you can LOSE more than $50 in a single hand (I've done it many times), you would be losing only $50 of your "own" money.  If you leave a table, you will not be able to return with a stack larger than $50.  Of course, there are many levels of PLHE/NLHE games, just as there are in LHE.

 $25/PLHE or $25/NLHE is usually the lowest level you can play for at most major sites.  The buy-in is determined by multiplying the big blind by 100, so you'll find $50 NLHE ($0.25 and $0.50 blinds), $100 NLHE ($0.50 and $1.00 blinds), and up.  This structure is the industry standard, although there will be variations on some sites.

When I play NLHE, it is usually on Party Poker.  This is because it is easiest to clear a deposit or redeposit bonus at this level, and you also limit your risk.  The greatest percentage of hands is raked at $50 PLHE/NLHE (almost 70%) compared to other levels (e.g. 50% at $3/$6 LHE), meaning that you clear the bonus more quickly while paying less in blinds ($0.75 versus $4 per orbit).

Let me begin by saying what you shouldn't do.  Don't play at the extreme micro-limit tables; these begin at $0.01/$0.02 and go up to $0.05/$0.10.  Although you will be able to play a long time on an initial $50 deposit, doing so at the extreme micro-limits will do you more harm than good in the long run.  Think about it: you know you are not playing these levels to make money, so you must be playing to improve your game.  The habits you will pick up playing against wildly loose players will cost you lots of money at the higher levels.  I don't see a big difference between these and the play money tables.

While the $0.50/$1.00 tables can still considered micro-limit, the game changes somewhat at this level.  A $50 bankroll is an absolute minimum ($100 is much better).  You will still be playing against a lot of loose maniacs, but you will be able to win money at this level with tight, solid play.  I did so for about a year.  You will learn good habits and increase your bankroll.

If you like tournament play, consider playing cheap or freeroll multi-table tournaments.  Almost all sites offer at least one freeroll tournament a day, although you must be quick to register for them.  The prizes aren't bad, either: entry into a larger, more lucrative tournament, cash, or bonus points.  You can play cheap multi-table tournaments for as little as $1; even though you will run into maniacs like those at the extreme micro-limits, solid tournament play will give you a big advantage.  If you just want the thrill of playing poker while improving your skills, these cheap and freeroll tournaments are some of the best bargains in online poker.

A lot of people like single-table tournaments, or Sit 'n' Gos (or SNGs, so named because they begin not at a scheduled time but whenever the table fills).  You can play these for as little as $5, although UltimateBet has recently introduced the $1 SNG.  The top three finish in the money, so these can be lucrative at higher levels ($10+$1 or higher) if you're a good tournament player.  The nice thing about SNGs is that you have an automatic stop-loss based on the amount of your buy-in.  Unlike playing the extreme micro-limit ring games, playing cheap SNGs is a good way to improve your game.

When you play low-limit hold'em, sign-up and redeposit bonuses matter much more than when you play middle-limit hold'em.  This is because these bonuses will account for a meaningful percentage of your profit.  Most beginners cannot afford to begin playing online with $500 or more.  That's fine; your initial sign-up bonus will not be as large as it might be, but that's not a big consideration in the long run.  Some sites will give you as much as $50 for a $50 sign-up deposit; using the 20%-25% bonus, you would have to deposit $400-$500 to get only $50 more.  So open your account with an amount with which you are comfortable.  With any luck, the site you choose will be one where you enjoy playing for a while.  Try to build up a bankroll of $400 or more.

Many people move their bankrolls from site to site to take advantage of sign-up bonuses.  For example, a newbie opens a $100 account at Party Poker, works it up to $200.  He then cashes out $200 from Party and opens an account at Paradise Poker, where he can get a 25% bonus up to $50.  Once the Paradise bonus is cleared, he moves on to Poker Room, or another site.  This strategy is a very common one, and it can work to your benefit provided you proceed with good information.  When you decide to move, make sure that you have enough to deposit to earn the maximum deposit bonus offered.  This amount can vary, but it is usually between $400 and $500.  Moving to a new site and playing there exclusively are big changes.  Be sure that the new site offers a fair bonus-clearing scheme (see Where to Play for reviews) so that it will not take you a long time to get your money before you can move to another site and bonus.  Verify that the new site offers the game(s) you like to play when you like to play them.  You may be used to having ten $1/$2 tables to choose from at Party Poker only to find one $1/$2 table (with a five deep waiting list!) at Gaming Club.  The bottom line is to not tie up your bankroll at one site when it could be doing you more good at another.

Once you feel comfortable with your play, you might consider playing two tables at once.  This is a huge advantage online poker rooms have over brick-and-mortar poker rooms.  If you are a winning player, you will maximize your profits and clear your bonuses twice as fast.  However, if you make a single mistake (clicking "Fold" when you meant to call or raise) because of confusion, you could cost yourself more than the advantage playing two tables accords you.

With luck, you will be able to build a bankroll large enough to keep parts of it at different sites, your bank account, or in Neteller.  Sometimes you will have only a few days to take advantage of a redeposit bonus, so you will want to have funds ready to deposit.  It's a good idea to sign-up for promotional emails and newsletters from these sites since they often tell you when they will offer a redeposit bonus.  Once your bankroll is large enough and you belong to enough sites, you can make $100 or more per month just on redeposit bonuses.  There have been months in which I've made over $500 in sign-up and redeposit bonuses alone, but the average is more like $300-$400.  See Bonus Codes for more information and strategies on bonus clearing.

Nobody will say that your money is 100% safe in online poker sites.  Over the past couple of years, there have been a couple of sites that have gone under, taking the deposits of its players with them.  You probably have little or no legal recourse if such an event does happen.  However, the online poker community seems to be satisfied by the legitimacy of the top sites: Party Poker, Poker Stars, Paradise Poker, UltimateBet, and a few others.  From time to time, players will comment about a delay in receiving cashouts (particularly if cashouts come in the form of a mailed check and not an electronic transfer), but they usually get them.  It's probably not the best idea to keep huge sums of cash in online sites (for lots of reasons), but I have not heard anything about any recent cases of fraud or insolvency.  If you are curious about a particular online site, you can search the Usenet newsgroup rec.gambling.poker or the Two Plus Two forums for player experiences.

Some sites are publicly-traded companies on European stock exchanges.  The biggest will be Party Gaming (which owns Party Poker, among other online casinos), which will be traded on the London Stock Exchange at the end of June 2005.  Empire Online (EOL), the parent company of Empire Poker, was the first online poker company to be publicly traded on the London Stock Exchange.  Other sites whose parents companies are publicly-traded include Pacific Poker and Paradise Poker.

Depending on the site and your method of cashout, you might receive your money in a few hours or a few weeks.  I've recommended Neteller as a method of depositing and cashing out (see Get Started), and I've only used it and IGMPay (the proprietary service of Party and Empire) for these services.  Some sites are very quick and professional with cashouts.  You should receive an email saying that the site received your cashout request and that it is being processed.  I have gotten some cashouts in less than two hours, but others have taken up to four days (this can be quite annoying if you want to get your money into another site).  In my experience, the average cashout time is about 24 hours.

I do, and I would if I were you.  I don't believe that online sites pass along any financial information to the IRS, but tax evasion is a serious offense in the event that you are audited.  If you have a Neteller account and a separate checking account, it will be pretty obvious where your money is coming from.  Why take a chance with so serious a crime?  If you are a winning player, treat your poker winnings like any other source of income.

See my article "Rakes of Online Poker Rooms"

While I don't believe I have ever encountered cheating or collusion during my play, I'd be naive to think that it doesn't happen.  One common ploy is two people in contact with one another via phone, playing at the same table.  They will tell each other their hands, then the one with the worse hand will try to build a pot for the other with timely raises.  Sometimes they can play from within the same room if they are able to log in through two unique IP addresses (by using two phone lines, for example).  Cheating is a much bigger problem in cash games than in tournaments (since solid tournament play will negate the effects of collusion).  Even so, players have been able to find ways to cheat in tournaments.  In 2006, Poker Stars was in the news because one of its players had managed to open multiple accounts under different names at the site.  This player then entered a single tournament multiple times, thereby giving him additional opportunities to win it.  This site eventually banned this player from the site and confiscated his funds, but his example showed just how much the industry had to learn about security.

That said, I'm not sure one has to worry too much about collusion while playing low-limit hold'em.  If one were going to cheat, it makes sense to do so at the higher stakes tables.  Moreover, these sites work extremely hard to prevent collusion and ban those who do cheat.  Because many online poker rooms are now publically-traded companies, their reputation for fairness is more important than ever, making them quite serious about catching cheaters.  If you suspect two people are in collusion, request a hand history for your session and forward it to the site's customer service.  If there is a history of two people playing suspiciously at the same table, then the site will usually take action against them.

All sites allow you to chat with other players at the table.  You always have the option of turning off the chat function, which is sometimes a good idea when the chat gets mean and abusive.  It's inevitable that you'll run into some nasty people while playing online poker.  They'll spew the worst sexist, racist, homophobic rants at whomever beats them in a hand.  Most sites will automatically censor the most common profanities.  The worst thing that you can do is to let these people affect your play, so turn off your chat if think this is a possibility.  At Party and Empire you can simply right-click a player's avatar to turn off his or her chat only.

On the other hand, there are lots of friendly and gracious players too.  I'm continually surprised by players who seemed like jerks (probably because they check-raised me) but who turn out to be quite nice and mature people.  There is a kind of abbreviated poker-speak that you'll see online.  Here are the most common acronyms:

• nh = "Nice hand."  This is usually spoken/typed in earnest, but not always.
• gg = "Good game."  Often said at the end of tournaments.
• ty = "Thank you."  Pretty obvious.  Usually said in response to "nh."
• lol = "Laughing out loud."  A common chat term.  Used in both nice and sarcastic ways.
• zzz = "I'm falling asleep."  There will usually be a lot more "z"s.  This means to speed up your play.
• omg = "Oh, my God!"  Almost always used to express amazement at an opponent's awful play that nevertheless wins him or her the pot.

If you're not offended, pay attention to what people say.  If one player continually gripes about losing to junk hands that suck out on him on the river, you know that that player usually plays good cards.  "How can you play that junk?" or "Keep playing trash" should tip you off that you may have to show down a good hand against that player.  Some people love to give "lessons" at the table.  Use their zeal against them.

Pot odds refers to the amount of money in the pot compared to the amount of money you must wager to win it.  For example, if there is $30 in the pot after the turn, and you must call a $6 bet, the pot is "laying" you 5:1.  You are wagering $6 for a chance to win $30.

Pot odds become useful when trying to determine whether it is worthwhile to call a bet when you're on a draw.  Let's say that you are holding

By the turn, the board looks like this:

Let's say that you are heads-up against a player to your right in a $3/$6 limit game.  There is $24 in the pot, and your opponent bets $6 on the turn card.  There's now $30 in the pot.  You must call $6 to see the river card, and you're reasonably certain that your opponent has an ace or a king.  However, you are sure that any diamond or a jack will give you a winning hand.

Therefore, you have 12 "outs": 9 diamonds and 3 jacks (the jack of diamonds counts only once).

There are 46 cards that you haven't seen.  12 of them will help you, which means that 34 of them won't.  Therefore, your odds of getting a favorable card on the river are 34:12, or about 2.8:1.

Because the pot is laying you 5:1 ($30 for a $6 bet) and the deck is laying you better than 3:1, you have an easy call.  The pot odds have made it right for you to do so.

You can see how being able to calculate pot odds can make you a better player.  Look at it this way: if there were a horse that was always 10:1 to win (you'd collect $20 on a $2 bet if it won), but the track would generously pay you $26 on a $2 bet if it won, you'd make that bet every time.  You'd be a millionaire before long if you began to bet more than $2 a race.  Poker is the same way: you're always trying to get as much money in the pot when you're a favorite, and you want the best payoff for your wager when you're an underdog.

A "tell" is an action that gives away the quality of your hand.  Some people like to play online poker because their physical tells give away too much information when they play poker in person.  Online tells usually have to do with the speed with which a player checks, bets, calls, or raises.  I'm reluctant to put too much weight on online tells because good players will mix up their tells, just as they would in person.  Even so, here are some observations I've had:

A very quick check usually indicates weakness.  The quick check may be a result of the player checking the automatic "Check/Fold" box or by manually clicking the "Check" button.  However, a quick check followed by a raise usually indicates that the player is not bluffing.

A very quick re-raise usually indicates strength.  You will run into the occasional maniac who will quickly re-raise with nothing, but if you do not see a history of such play at your table, proceed with extreme caution.

A long pause before a call could indicate strength or weakness.  Sometimes players will try to trick you into thinking that they are contemplating folding when they really have a strong hand.  You will have to take the context of the hand into consideration.  Say you bet on the flop and your opponent takes a long time to call.  If he calls, he could have anything.  If you bet on the turn and are quickly raised, you should assume that you are beaten.  Your opponent probably flopped a powerful hand such as two pair or a set (many people will slowplay a hand like this to wait for increased betting level).  However, if he pauses again before calling, he is on a draw (watch out for straight and flush possibilities on the river as well as the board pairing) or has a pair that is worse than yours (provided that you are playing strong cards to begin with).

A long pause before a raise could indicate strength or weakness.  Again, you will have to review the play of the hand.  Sometimes a player will realize that the only way to win a hand is to raise.  It usually takes a little time to come to this conclusion.  Did two cards of the same suit fall on the flop without a third materializing on the river, and did your opponent passively call your bets on the flop and turn?  In the end, it is extremely dicey to put any faith into a tell like this one on the river.  It's usually a mistake to fold to a single bet on the river if you have any kind of quality hand and if the pot is of decent size.

The only poker-related software that I use is Poker Tracker.  A lot of people use this program to get a better read on their opponents, but I use it more for recordkeeping.  If you tend to play a lot on one site and with the same group of players, a program like Poker Tracker can be extremely valuable.  You can find out how often a player tries to steal the blinds from the cutoff or button, how often a player folds his or her blinds to a steal attempt, how often a player raises preflop, how many big bets a player wins (or loses) per 100 hands, etc.  There's a program extension that will even overlay these numbers on your poker client window, but I've never used this feature.  I've logged over 120,000 hands that I've played since I started using this program, but you can get meaningful statistics after a few thousand hands.  The program can automatically pull your hand histories off your hard drive or email server.  Go to the Poker Tracker site to get more information and download a free trial version.

As far as I know, not really.  I've run the most recent version of Ad-Aware on my personal computer, and it found only one suspicious item: a regkey from Microgaming.  Microgaming provides the software for the Gaming Club and Royal Vegas poker sites, among others.  If you're concerned about this regkey (I'm not quite sure what it is supposed to do), avoid these Microgaming sites.

Some online poker software clients can check to see what other software your computer is running while you are playing online poker.  The client then uploads this information to the online poker site.  Poker sites do this to make sure that you are not running any software that would give you an unfair advantage against other players or software that automatically plays hands for you ("bots").