Winning Online Poker

Get free money to keep playing on Party Poker! Check out the Party Poker skins.

Note: All ratings out of 10 possible, 10 being the best and 0 the worst

Overall real money rating: 9 (Site security: very secure)

Overall play money rating: 6

Party Poker is the most profitable site on the internet, but the software and support are very poor-quality. Party also has several skins, including Empire Poker, Intertops Poker, and MultiPoker, where you can get additional deposit bonuses. (What is a skin?)

Maximum Tables You Can Play at One Time: 4

Beatable Games: 9

Thanks to the rampant advertising of Party through various channels, the games are easily better than any of the other big sites like UltimateBet, Poker Stars or Paradise Poker. Generally speaking, if your goal is to make money, this is the place to do it, regardless of what game or limit you play.

Game Selection: 8

Party only offers the five big games (hold ‘em, Omaha, Omaha H/L, 7-stud, 7-stud H/L), but they have a huge number of pot-limit and no-limit games running, and you should be able to find a table at any game and limit you want, although the wait lists are sometimes long for extremely profitable tables. All limits from .50/1 to 15/30 will have plenty of tables running for all games, although they limit the number of tables for very high limits such as 30/60. They do have one annoying restriction: the maximum buy-in (relative to the blinds) at pot-limit and no-limit tables is now half that of the other major sites (50 big blinds instead of 100), making them slightly more expensive to play. Also, the ante at low-limit stud games is much too high, forcing you to play looser so the rake doesn't kill you.

Player Traffic: 10

With the recent spate of World Poker Tour and World Series of Poker TV viewers joining Party Poker, there is always an enormous number of players on the server. Finding a game is never a problem. Even games like limit Omaha high that you will never see on other servers are usually running here.

Deposit Bonuses / Player Rewards / Jackpots: 8

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Party currently has no player rewards program or jackpots, but you can get a 20% deposit bonus (up to $100) by entering bonus code WINNING100. For players on a smaller bankroll, you can get a $25 bonus on your initial deposit of $50 at Party if you choose, with bonus code WINNING25. At 5 raked hands per dollar, the bonus money is easy to clear, relative to other sites. The sites also offer some comeback bonuses (20% up to $100, sometimes more) if you haven’t played there for awhile, giving players an incentive to return.

Another nice bonus offer exists. If you have a checking account you can register with IGMPAY, and use bonus code IGMPAY to get a 20% bonus up to $100 the first time you use it to deposit at Party. With $200 in potential bonuses to every customer and lax requirements to clear (5 raked hands per dollar), this is a good site to hit for a deposit bonus.

Software / Peripherals: 5

No online site can be perfect, and Party’s major downfall comes from their software. The cards and chips do not look particularly nice, the tables aren’t pretty, the color setup is annoying, and the lobby has no %/flop feature, depriving you of a vital clue in finding loose tables to sit at. Party has recently released a software update that is an improvement over the old one in lobby design, but it is still buggy.

Tournaments: SNGs 9, Multi-Tables 9

Party offers a bigger selection of single-table tournaments than any other site, with a nice variety of games and limits. If you don't want to wait at all for a sit-and-go to fill up, this is the place to play them. They also have a good selection of very large multi-table tournaments. If you like taking a shot at a huge prize and aren't intimidated by the thought of having to beat 1000 players or sitting down for six hours or more in a row, these are for you. Many of your opponents in these tourneys will literally be giving their money away with little or no chance to win a prize.

Customer Support: 4

Party has improved their cashout speed, and most cashouts now hit your Neteller account within a few hours. However, they have discontinued their live support feature, and their email support team is often unhelpful.

Server Quality: 5

This is one area where Party Poker has improved markedly over the past year. There used to be a daily post on 2+2's Internet forum titled "Party down X:XX EST". Now the server has far fewer shutdowns, making for much smoother and less frustrating play.