Is Online Poker Free?

When non-poker playing friends and family discover that you play poker online the first couple of questions they pose to are generally “How much did you win?” and “how much did you lose?” but occasionally they ask “is online poker free to play?” Of course you answer that online poker free of charge does exist because the various sites do not charge a monthly fee to play their games, instead they charge a small percentage of each pot or take a piece of the tournament prize pool as rake.

Every single site offers free online poker games, either for what is known as play money, or through tournaments with no buy-in requirements, known as freerolls. Play money games will allow you to play online poker free of charge, but you cannot actually win any actual money because the chips have no monetary value. However, taking part in freerolls could see you net some free money.

Finding online poker free games

As mentioned, every poker site you have ever played on offers online poker games in some way shape or form, but the best value online poker games are the freeroll tournaments mentioned earlier as they usually pay out in real money or, at the very least, prizes such as iPads and the like. These free online poker games are usually offered to new customers who make their first deposit onto a particular site, but from time to time sites offer online poker games to celebrate the signing of a new resident professional player or the launch of a new product. At present many sites are offering poker free games in relation to the upcoming World Series of Poker, the biggest poker festival on Earth.

Using online poker free play games to improve your game

Free poker games can be a useful medium to learn how to play a particular poker variant. If you usually play Texas Hold'em and fancy learning how to play Pot Limit Omaha then playing play money games could be a good idea as it means you are not risking any of your hard-earned cash. You should not put too much focus and energy into these poker games though as they do not play much like the games being played for real money, due to the fact nobody can lose any money so they play extremely loose and aggressive, which borders on the ridiculous. That said, online poker free play games are good for learning the ropes and the freeroll tournaments can be a good way to gain some valuable experience in a tournament scenario.