The Idea Zone

Learning Poker with Play Money

Facebook is littered with advertisements for poker games that you can play directly from your web browser. These poker games don’t require any money because you’re only playing for fake chips, virtual cash, or at most, petty prizes. Even major poker rooms like Caesars Online offer an opportunity to play with fake money rather than cash. However, some players mistakenly believe that this is a good place to train themselves for real play. While there are some things that play money poker is good for, that is not one of them.

The primary reason you should not use play money to teach yourself is that there is no risk involved. This applies to both you and the opposing players. Your competitors will not care nearly so much about making big bets, risky plays, or calling you down to the river for the sake of curiosity alone. You can’t get a sense of player behavior in any realistic fashion if you’re dealing with play money.

In addition, you won’t get a sense of your own comfort with making bets. It’s easy to make big pushes and plays when you’re risking a whole lot of nothing. It’s entirely different when what you’re pushing onto the table could be paying for a flat screen television.

However, play money poker does have its place in the education process. If you’re entirely new to poker as a game, play money is the ideal way to teach yourself the basic rules. If you’re not sure how the rounds of betting go, which hands beat other hands, or if you want to experiment with calculating the math of the game, each of these things can be done in play money games. This allows you to get some practice in very specific areas without risking any of your bankroll.