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I recently received two bonus offers in the mail. One was from a room that I had never played at before, and the other was from a room where I logged tens of thousands of hands. Here is how I compare the two.
A Tale of Two Bonuses
♠ Bonus Percentages and Amounts
Room A: Offered a 30% bonus, capped at $500. That was paired with 5% "unrestricted cash" capped at $100. I'm assuming unrestricted cash goes right into my player account, and I can use it at the tables.
I would need a deposit of $2,000 to max out the "unrestricted cash" offer and the bonus offer.
Room B: A whopping 350% bonus up to $1750. That is insanely huge. A deposit of $500 will earn me max bonus of $1,750.
♠ Raked Hands Requirement
Room A: Considers any hand that's raked $.50 as counting towards your bonus. For every 20 raked hands I play, I'll earn $5 in bonus money.
Room B: Considers a raked hand as any hand that is raked $1 or more. If a hand is raked less, you will get partial credit for it. So, if the hand is raked $.25, you get credit for .25 of a raked hand.
Partial credit is certainly better than no credit at all, but Room A has a lower threshold for a hand being declared as "raked".
♠ Releasing The Bonus
Room A: Releases the bonus in $5 increments, every 20 hands. That comes to $.25 per raked hand.
I can play off the whole bonus in 2,000 hands.
Room B: Releases the bonus in $10 increments. 20 raked hands earns $1 in bonus money, so I will need to play 200 raked hands to release $10 in bonus. That's $.05 per hand.
To earn $600 in bonus money, I would have to play 12,000 hands. Releasing the entire bonus of $1,750 would require playing 35,000 raked hands.
♠ Expiration Dates
Room A: Holds money in a bonus account for up to 60 days.
Room B: Holds bonus money for 30 days.
As a cash game player, those are the items I looked at closely. It also illustrates that the amount of the bonus money that a room is offering is only one piece of information.
I've seen bonuses that are paid out at the rate of roughly 1¢ per hand. It wouldn't matter how large the amount of money was, at that rate it would take forever to play it off. Room B wasn't that bad, and a rate of a 5¢ a hand is not at all unreasonable. It's just not the better of these two offers.
When contemplating taking advantage of an offer, consider these . . .
Poker Bonus Factors
- Bonus Percentages and Max Amounts
- higher percentage bonuses require less bankroll to claim the max bonus.
- Raked Hands Requirement
- find out what constitutes a raked hand
- learn how many hands constitutes $x in bonus money
- Releasing the Bonus
- in what increments (if any)is the bonus released
- Expiration Dates
- how long will you have to earn bonus money before it expires
If you know what to look for, and are realistic about the amount of time you'll be playing and the stakes you'll be playing for, poker room bonuses can be a wonderful way to add chips to your stack.
If you're not sure what you're getting into, it can be a frustrating experience to find out that you'll never earn the $600 in bonus money you thought you were going to get, by playing at the $11 Sit n Go tables.
Recommended Poker Bonuses:
Absolute Poker has been the king of poker room bonuses for years. Although anything is subject to change, if you're interested in finding a poker room for comparison's sake, use Absolute Poker's offer as a benchmark.
Ultimate Bet also bonuses generously.
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