Rakeback in Poker
What Will I Learn?
Earn Massive Poker Rakeback
When you’re new to poker, you’re generally more concerned about having fun. It makes sense to be avoiding things like rakeback as they might seem too complex. But, as you gain more experience, you may realize the value of good rakeback offers and promotions. They can help you maximize your profits from poker. Did you know that online poker rakeback allows you to earn some real money even in you happen to lose during the game?
In this guide, you’ll learn everything you need to know about rakeback in poker and how to use it to your advantage. First, let’s take a look at exactly how much rakeback you could be earning:
Rake explained
To understand how the rakeback works, you’ll need to first learn about the rake. To earn revenue and make a profit, online poker rooms charge fees from the game. These fees are commonly known as the rake.
In a cash game, an online poker site takes a certain portion of the pot after the hand is complete. Poker rooms have different ways of doing this, but you’ll mostly find operators retrieving the rake only after the flop. If you raise pre-flop and other players fold, then no rake is taken by the house. Cash tables usually have pot rakes ranging from 5% to 10% and a cap of maximum rake for each stakes.
Tournament poker rake refers to the fees you pay before joining an event. For instance, if you’re participating in a $20 tournament or sit go, your rake may be expounded as $18 + $2. This means the company earns $2 in tournament fees, which is collected from each player from their entry fee. Assuming 200 players participate in the poker tournament, the operator would receive $400 of rake in total.
You don’t need to be a genius in poker to understand that for every $5 that operators retrieve from the pots played, players will ”lose” that $5. If you’re competing for a $100 pot, you’ll only get $95 in case you win. Depending on how you see it, you’re kind of short of $5. This figure grows as you play more cash games and poker tournaments.
Some poker rooms have such high rake structures that making any sizable profits becomes a real challenge for any player. Rake can eat up a big chunk of your bankroll in the long run. You’ll need to protect your bankroll in these high rake environments if you’re looking to make some profit from online poker.
What’s the easiest way of reducing the rake you pay? You probably guessed that already: taking advantage of poker rakeback.
Rakeback explained
Rakeback refers to a percentage of the rake that online poker sites refund their players. That’s the origin for the term rakeback, a poker site giving some of the rake back to their players. These refunds can also be portions of other house fees – they don’t necessarily have to be part of the rake taken from the cash games or tournaments. Poker rooms offer rakeback as a way of compensating their loyal, high-volume customers. In case you play a decent volume of poker hands every month, you may be eligible for worthwhile rakeback payments.
The percentage of rakeback offered varies depending on the poker room. You’ll sometimes find online poker rakeback rates as high as 75%, but these are mostly reserved for the customers who play a crazy amount of hands of high stakes poker. If you’re an average player, then you can expect an average rakeback offer ranging from 20 to 40%.
Generally speaking, you’ll need to play a specified minimum amount to redeem rakeback. A few online poker rooms may require you to contribute a minimum rake amount before paying out your rakeback. The amount of rakeback depends largely on the portion of your poker game’s rake, with higher limits generating a bigger amount of rakeback. Many online poker networks like partypoker have implemented a progressive rakeback. This means you’ll earn a bigger percentage once your VIP level increases. With progressive rakeback, you can climb the ladder to get paid a bigger weekly rakeback.
How does rakeback work in practice
Let’s do a simple illustration so you can better understand how rakeback deals typically work. Take a UK online poker room like Betfair that offers rakeback on the iPoker network. Betfair gives a 30% return on the rake amount you’ve given away during the week, every Monday. Let’s assume you’ve enjoyed your game for about 20 hours, each hour generating worth $50 of rake. You’ve paid about $1000 in rake for the real money poker games during the week.
With the 30% rakeback offer, you can expect a return of about $300 every Monday. Now, the $300 rakeback is paid directly in cash into your account with no strings attached. You can withdraw it to buy something nice, or add it to your bankroll to play some more. The decision of how to use your rakeback money is entirely up to you!
Why do poker sites offer rakeback deals
Aside from rewarding VIP customers, rakeback deals are leveraged as a means of drawing in new customers in the poker industry. They help boost player satisfaction and encourage the existing players to recommend the poker room to other players and friends. Even though they might decrease margins of online poker rooms a bit, these promotions attract so many new players that the benefits outweigh the sting from lower profit margins. Due to the promotional value of rakeback, offering it is usually a win-win for both players and online poker rooms.
Note that online poker sites can reward players in different ways other than rakeback as well. In fact, some poker rooms offer rewards that are more valuable than rakeback. These reward programs award you player points. The value of these points depends on the rake amount you generate at the tables. Once you’ve accumulated enough points, you can exchange them for special rewards like exclusive tickets, valuable merchandise, and even cold, hard cash. A monthly reward program with fixed rate cash rewards is called a rake chase.
Another typical reward you can get is a sign-up bonus you get as a new player. Even if a poker network doesn’t award any rakeback deals, it might have more appealing promotions like deposit bonuses and loyalty programs. That’s why we recommend you to check each poker room’s promotions thoroughly. Pay attention to promotions with rakeback offers valued at over 40% though! There’s a big chance that such poker rooms are finding it difficult to get new customers by other means.
How to start earning rakeback
Setting up a poker account with rakeback isn’t difficult and it only takes a few minutes. Just take the steps according to the following process:
- Look for poker sites with worthwhile rakeback deals
- Follow the detailed instructions on signing up with rakeback on a site
- If there’s a bonus code or a sign-up code, remember to type it is when registering your player account
- Confirm your identity
- Pick your preferred deposit method, deposit some funds & start earning rakeback
Most online poker sites don’t allow existing players to switch to a rakeback account. This means you have to create an entirely new account on another poker room to take advantage of rakeback rewards. Keep in mind that signing up a second poker account as an existing customer may be a violation of the T&Cs of most online poker rooms. You should make sure to switch the poker room when applying for a player account with rakeback. In a few instances, you can contact customer support through e-mail or live chat and request them to close your previous account on the site and open a new one. This option is not guaranteed to work, as most online poker rooms have very strict rules on rakeback and bonuses – yet it might be worth a try.
How poker sites calculate rakeback
As we’ve explained earlier, a rakeback is a portion of your paid rake that you receive as a cash reward from an online poker room. Here are the most commonly used ways poker rooms apply to calculate this portion:
Contributed Rakeback
This is a percentage of your total contributed cash to the pot. Let’s assume you put a total of $100 into the pot. The online poker room receives 5%, meaning their rake is about $5. With a rakeback of 40%, the house may return $2 to you.
Dealt Rakeback
Players being dealt a hand are eligible for this type of rakeback. If you’re competing with 5 players at a poker table and the pot is $200, the poker room might receive $10 with a rake of about 5%. Assuming there’s a 30% rakeback, players will first divide the rake, which equates to $6. After sharing, you’ll each receive approximately $2 in rakeback. This rakeback type suits players who play poker with a low VPIP (Voluntarily Put $ in Pot).
Progressive rakeback
The percentage you get is based on the hands played or the amount of rake paid. So, if you play a variety of hands, then your portion increases. And the higher the amount of rake you provide, the higher the amount you get in return. This system favors multi-tablers, as casual poker players often receive low amounts.
Do you need to have a rakeback deal for poker
There’s no question about the benefit of rakeback to your bottom line. It helps all types of online poker players. The more you play online, the more you rake – which in turn, translates to a bigger amount of money paid to you through rakeback. And who wouldn’t want some extra money by playing poker? Now, it can be argued that grinders and poker professionals benefit from a rakeback program the most. Recreational players may not find poker rakeback as beneficial due to lower volume. Still, it’s free money offered by the poker room that no one should turn down. Boosting your profits by learning a new poker strategy is much harder than finding a high online poker rakeback offer!
When you’re playing casually at the casinos or online poker rooms, you often aim to just enjoy the poker game. This means you generate less rake than competitive players and professionals. You might get some extra buy-ins of rakeback money, but it won’t be a life-changing amount. As a poker professional things are different. You should strive to find the best rakeback deal possible, as it forms an important chunk of your earnings. Aside from winning at the games you play online, you’ll aim to accumulate as much rakeback rewards as you can during the year.
Even if you happen to go through several losing sessions, you might walk off a winner when counting in your total rakeback and bonus money. That’s why having a RB deal is important, especially if you earn your living from real money poker games.
Conclusion
Rakeback deals are a hassle-free way of recouping some of the money paid in rake and tournament fees in online poker. A great rakeback deal can turn a losing week into a winning one. For this reason, you should aim to search for the most valuable rakeback offers. Make sure you do your research thoroughly. You can start looking for information on these deals at our Beasts Of Poker website.
Visit any well-known online poker room at our poker room reviews and look into their rakeback offers. If you don’t find any helpful information, you can contact our support staff – we’ll get you the best deal in no time! Sometimes we go even further and request to speak directly to the gambling site’s manager. This way we can negotiate VIP rakeback for our players.
Dedicated online poker forums can also assist you in discovering rakeback gems. Poker players are very open about their experiences when writing anonymously on these forums. If you dig in more, you’ll probably find a poker player bragging about a valuable deal they received. Ensure you ask questions so that you get enough information to make your decision. A good place to start asking other poker players about their experiences would be our Discord channel.
As a rule of thumb, avoid signing up for the first offer you receive. Try to look into other offers, comparing both their pros and cons. When you sign-up to an online poker room through Beasts Of Poker, it’s a very rare chance that you’ll find a more lucrative VIP rakeback deal elsewhere. If you do, please let us know so we can match those deals.
The importance of rakeback can’t be understated – it will help you last in the poker game for longer, keeping your bankroll intact. What to do next? Head to our poker site reviews, sign-up for a site with rakeback, and start earning some extra money!
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Rakeback Guide FAQ
Rakeback is the sum you get back from rake generated at the poker tables. You can think of it as a cashback for online poker. For example, if you rake $100 playing cash games at an online poker room and have a 40% rakeback deal from us, your poker account would be credited with $40. The rakeback payments are usually processed either weekly or monthly.
Poker operators also reward their loyal players with rakeback, deposit bonuses, rake races and VIP rewards. Even if earn rakeback, you’re eligible for other types of bonuses too. That’s why it’s important to check for the best bonus offers regularly.
Here’s a list of rake calculation methods that online poker sites use:
- Simple Contributed rake: Equal amount of rake is taken from players who have investment money in the pot.
- Weighted Contributed: The rake is taken from the pot based on the exact amount of money each participating player has invested. Weighted Contributed can be considered as the most fair way to calculate the rake.
- Actual rake: The whole rake amount is assigned to the winner of the hand.
The most common methods for rakeback calculation are the following:
- Weighted Contributed rakeback: You’re entitled for your money’s share in any given pot. For example, if you go put $10 dollars in the pot of $20 dollars, the rake is $1. With a 30% rakeback deal you would get back 10/20*1*0.3= $0.15
- Dealt rakeback: As long as you’ve been dealt cards, the rake is dealt equally between players in any given pot. With dealt rake, you don’t have to put any money in the pot to get the rakeback.
- Progressive or shared rakeback: This is a mix between contributed and dealt methods. You have to play the hand but everyone gets an equal share of the rake as rakeback.
Yes – with a good poker rakeback deal, you can sometimes even double or triple your profits at the tables. Rakeback makes your winning months bigger and covers some of the losses during losing months. Even a break-even poker player will win some money at the tables if they have an RB deal.
Yes! The best aspect of rakeback is that you make money even when you lose pots. Most professional online poker players make a large part of their long-term profit from rakeback and other poker bonuses. The more you play poker, the more rakeback you earn. If you play poker on multiple tables simultaneously and put in long sessions, you might make big 5-figures on a yearly basis from rakeback alone.
Rakeback is extra money you can get on top of winnings and you should leave no edge unused. Online poker is getting tougher and tougher each year as the average player becomes more skilled. That’s why it’s more important than ever to maximize your profits and minimize your mistakes. And don’t worry, mistakes happen for everyone! With rakeback, you get some money back even from the pots you lose.
You can get rakeback with following simple steps:
- Create a poker account on a poker site that offers rakeback.
- Deposit some funds and play cash games or tournaments.
- Wait until the end of the week or month to get your rakeback payment.
Absolutely! Rakeback is the standard way for online poker rooms to reward their active players. Poker sites like partypoker pay you rakeback on a weekly basis to your poker account. If you’re playing poker with a rakeback deal for the first time, make sure to check your account is properly tracked before you start playing. We have instructions on how to do that on each online poker room review here at BeastsOfPoker.
No, rakeback is very important for every player whether you play poker recreationally or for a living. There is no player who isn’t happy to receive extra cashback from their play at the end of the week or month!
The best rakeback online poker sites include partypoker and GGPoker. Both sites offer daily leaderboards for cash game players. In some cases, high volume players are getting an effective rakeback as high as 60 to 90%. On top of RB, you can also get a deposit bonus on both partypoker and GGPoker. Both of these sites offer tournament series with huge guaranteed prize pools as well.
You get up to 40% rakeback paid directly on your partypoker account every week when you sign-up through Beasts Of Poker. On GGPoker, you get Fish Buffet points that you can convert to cash rewards. For rakeback on other sites like PokerStars, just check our reviews for those sites to find out the exact amount of rakeback offered to our players.
Yes. With a good rakeback offer, you can increase your online poker earnings, regardless of whether you’re an amateur or an experienced player. You’ll even find some players whose sole profits come from rakeback money as their bottom line would be negative without it.
The term rakeback pro refers to someone who gets their income purely from rakeback. They’re essentially online poker players who multitable for hours on end, lose some money on the games they play but make a profit through rakeback alone.
Rakeback pros can be sit ‘n go players or cash game players. Putting in a lot of volume is key for them – the more rake you generate, the more rakeback you will earn. The best rakeback poker pros can earn thousands of dollars in bonus money in a single month.
Many poker rooms offer cash bonuses and rewards through a VIP program instead. Online poker rakeback, rake chase and rake race offers tend to attract more professional players who utilize poker solvers, trackers and other types of poker software. Thus, it makes sense for online poker rooms to carefully select their promotions.
There’s no set minimum amount that card rooms give you – your rake back percentage varies from one room to another. By the same token, there’s no maximum amount you can get. If you do your research well, you can access sites with percentages as high as 70%.
While many players use these terms interchangeably, cashback and rakeback differ slightly. Cashback allows you to exchange your player points for cash rewards. Sometimes cashback programs can offer more earnings. Some poker sites will require you to only convert a few status points in exchange for prize rewards like tournament tickets. Reading T&Cs helps you know whether a site’s cashback system is better than a rakeback deal.
Yes, they do. Our site Beasts Of Poker has negotiated some of the best rakeback deals available on online poker rooms for our players. Make sure to check out the latest rakeback offers for each poker room at our poker sites section.
Yes, Poker Bros usually offer rakeback deals between 30 % and 40%. Rakeback on Poker Bros is paid on a weekly basis. To get a deal for rake back on Poker Bros, check out our Poker Bros review and clubs.
While 888 Poker doesn’t have a fixed rakeback deal, their players can earn up to 36% cashback in their VIP program. You’ll accumulate 888 points for playing any real money tournament, sit go games or cash game hands and climb up the member status levels as you put in more hours at the tables.
No, rakeback is prohibited on Ignition Poker. Instead, Ignition Poker offers poker points that you can use for tournament tickets or casino chips.
Author
Beasts Of Poker
Editorial team curates and publishes in-depth reviews and ratings of online poker sites by using their extensive industry experience. Content is created by both in-house team of experts and outside authority contributors.
