Epic Reviews - News - Features - US Poker - Strategy
BY JOSH H, OWNER AND EDITOR-IN-CHIEF
In my poker site infancy, finding an "easy" poker site was as easy as spinning the dial, jumping headfirst into the easiest fish pond advertising on TV, and beating the games at will. Just sit back, cast your line, and if you were a half-decent player you usually would win. Soft games were the rule rather than the exception.
Today? Not too many easy poker games exist. Dwindling new real money players, tight-fisted poker site promotions, a wishy-washy economy, and borderline cheating heads-up display users nearly ruined a beautiful thing.
What used to be easy poker sites are now often filled with a mature poker populace that ties up their bankrolls tighter than the Gordian Knot. They splash some chips around online poker rooms about every Halley's Comet visit or two.
Depressing thoughts, to be sure. Here's the thing, though:
There are still easy poker sites around if you know where to look.
Don't be that player who swears off online poker because you lost your deposit at PokerStars to some HUD-leeching, 20-table grinding, single-digit-flop-percentage-creating "shark".
Be the wanderer who found the soft easy poker oasis in the shark-filled sands, where the casual players file in like sardines waiting to be canned.
I've been on the beat looking for the easiest and softest poker sites, especially for USA online poker players, to win at for more than 15 years.
Let's dive into it and look at:
It may not be what it once was, but there's no denying that 888 Poker remains one of the easiest poker sites online thanks to its casino association.
They give away free easy money and come out with wacky ideas to draw casuals like webcam tables. That crowd is exactly the fish you want to be playing against.
Bonus:
100% up to €400
plus
€88 free instantly
Playable on:
These flop/pot numbers might not jump off the screen, but they're higher than most of the competition at these higher stakes. 888 Poker is one of the easiest poker sites to win at thanks to their weaker player base.
4.5/5 Stars
Riding the graph of softness of competition at Party Poker over the years would give a lot of players motion sickness.
After reaching their low point, they're making a comeback by attracting recreational easy poker players. It's now one of the easiest places to play.
Bonus:
100% up to €500
plus
€20 cash
Playable on:
They aren't terribly popular, but one game type helping to make Party Poker easier is the beginner section. These softer poker tables restrict multi-tabling, making it more likely to be populated by casual players.
4/5 Stars
Please never change, Unibet Poker. They made a great decision to open up their own network and bad/casual players have been flocking there.
The fun-looking software helps and you'll mostly find easy games full of fishy players who just seem to enjoy gambling it up rather than trying to win.
Bonus:
€20 free instantly
plus
€200 more as you play
Playable on:
You won't be able to see table stats in the lobby (that's party of what helps), but Unibet Poker is now one of the easiest sites to beat. It's largely populated by soft easy-to-beat players trying out the poker room from one of Unibet's other gaming sections.
4.5/5 Stars
All fast-fold poker variations play tighter than the standard softer cash games, but take a look at how great Ignition Poker's Zone numbers are.
Although there are still plenty of "easy" poker site choices for the perennial favorite Texas Hold'em, there are some hidden treasure troves of bad players who fill the Omaha tables.
Sit down at soft online poker rooms and be surrounded by players who can't even spell poker. Yes, Phil, thanks for the line.
Take control over easy poker players by either making them pay to draw out on your strongest hands or by betting for value against calling stations.
Not every poker site plays the same. Find the ones with easy poker games and be prepared to write a lot of + symbols in black (or green is my preference) in that won/lost column.
The simplest way to find easy poker games online? Look for flop percentages exceeding 25-30% and average pots of at least 20-25x the big blind.
How easy a poker site is will depend on factors such as the quality of players, the number of games available, and the availability of HUDs. Certain poker sites simply attract easier players because of their target audience. I currently rate Bovada, Global Poker, and 888 Poker as the easiest poker sites to profit on.
Besides judging from my personal playing experience, I like to look at a poker site’s table statistics. Higher flop percentages and average pots indicate more action, which is generally easier to profit from for experienced players.
In general, the largest US poker sites are easier to beat than those only open to the rest of the world, such as PokerStars or Full Tilt Poker. Global Poker accepts Americans and is very soft, largely thanks to their ability to draw inexperienced new players from social media. Bovada is also quite loose and they’ve always been that way because of their aggressive sports betting clientele.
To be clear, no poker site is "easy" in a vacuum. No one is going to pay you just for showing up. When I refer to a site as easy, I mean that solid experienced players will probably find it more profitable on average than competing sites.
That will mostly be due to a softer average player base and it will often be at the expense of your short-term variance. Easy poker sites are more volatile, but have a higher ceiling for wins thanks to looser and softer games.
I think there are four main factors that determine how difficult a poker site's player base is:
1. The clientele the poker site tries to attract
2. Support for poker tracking software
3. Rewards for grinders
4. The design of the poker software
Generally speaking, when poker players talk about an "easy" poker table or the fishiest games, they're talking about games filled with loose-aggressive (also called maniacs) or loose-passive (also called calling stations) player types.
Poker players willing to commit a lot of chips on gambles, hunches, blind aggression, or, in the case of calling stations, simply because you did it first, are going to result in bigger average pots and more easy poker players seeing each flop.
Since the most common play style of educated poker players is tight-aggressive, they fit with loose players perfectly who can be waited out for big pots with premium hands. The easiest real money poker sites to win are the ones filled with that type of soft competition.
Signs of easy poker games will include:
Conversely, poker sites filled with tight timid players are usually the toughest to crack profits with.
For one reason alone: you'll win more often and see a greater hourly win rate against easy players. Although you'll see more bad beats and increase your variance against easy poker players, that's actually exactly what you should hope for.
If you're consistently getting poker money into the pot when you're the favorite to win, you're making correct decisions, regardless of the outcome. Simple math proves that, long-term, you'll always see positive value from being the favorite.
Easy players giving you action on your premium hands and putting in entire stacks on speculative hands is exactly who you want playing at your next poker site.