We are a team of professional poker players who devote a lot of time to studying poker and researching the best games. With our firsthand experience playing on various online poker sites, we can easily assess the pros and cons of each room and evaluate what really matters.
Why You Can Trust Us
In addition to developing our rating system, we devote considerable time to carefully monitoring the websites we list and ensuring our ratings are up to date. As a result, you will see adjustments in our lists over time.
On top of that, we are not shy to add poker sites to our backlist if they fail to support players, lose licenses, or end up applying any unfair tactics. Whether it is holding a player’s winnings, not putting effort into preventing cheating, or any other inadequacy mishandling, we will not list and recommend these sites.
If you were mistreated by a poker site, please let us know so we can investigate and evaluate the site further.
We are here for the long term, so it is only in our best interest to build an active community and recommend sites that we trust and pay for ourselves:
On top of that, our team pokercoaching.com team consists of top poker players along with our community members, and here are just a few of the names:
- Jonathan Little – pokercoaching.com founder, a two-time World Poker Tour (WPT) champion, prolific author, and known educator in the poker community.
- Justin Saliba – two WSOP bracelets winner, GTO poker strategy expert, and a prominent figure in the high-stakes tournament poker scene.
- Matt Affleck – a professional poker player and lead coach at PokerCoaching.com, with over $4 million in live and online tournament earnings.
- Chris Brewer – known for his analytical approach and dominance in both cash games and tournaments Chris has accumulated over $25 million in live tournament earnings, placing him among the top players globally.
- Tristan Wade – a World Series of Poker (WSOP) bracelet winner and a recognized poker instructor with success in both live and online poker games.
This is just a part of our team, which is always expanding and includes poker journalists, bloggers, and experts from other areas of this niche. If you have any questions or recommendations, do not hesitate to contact us.
Our 7-Step Rating Process for Poker Sites:
In addition to our decades of experience playing ourselves, we also asked our users what they value the most and tailored our process to reflect real-world needs not only from the pros but also from everyday players.
Here are the core 7 areas that we assign different weights and consider in our review process when ranking online poker sites:
- Safety and Security
- Level of competition & games variety
- Software reliability
- Bonuses and promotion value
- Payment options
- Customer support
- Trustworthiness
Step #1. Safety and security
The security and safety of your funds are clearly one of the most important issues for the players, so we prioritize this. We evaluate software security, encryption, licensing, measures taken to prevent cheating, and third-party audits.
Things we consider:
- License and operations in legal markets
- Trusted and audited RNG (random number generator) by 3rd party
- Measures taken to prevent cheating and the use of illegal software
- Encrypted and safe data transmission
Step #2. Level of competition & games variety
We look into game selection on different stakes, how many tournaments and cash game tables are running during different times of the day, and how many recreational players you can expect to find.
Things we consider:
- How easy is it to beat different games
- How many tournaments and cash game tables are running
- Game selection on different stakes
- Variety of games at different times of the game
- The offer of different formats
- Do they have a big and valuable series
- Free-to-play options via freerolls and promotions
Step 3. Software reliability
Our main concern is how reliable and easy to use the software is and whether you can access the games conveniently from both desktop and mobile.
Things we consider:
- How reliable is software and user interface
- Is poker client easy to use and offers convenient filters
- Can you comfortably play on a desktop and mobile phone
- What settings and options you can adjust to make your games more convenient
Step #4. Bonuses & promotion value
From sign-up bonuses to rakeback and ongoing promotions, we evaluate how much value goes back to the player.
Things we consider:
- Do they offer a good sign-up bonus
- Does the site have a rakeback offer
- Do they run ongoing promotions for MTT and cash game players
- Terms and conditions for these offers
- Ongoing VIP program or rewards theme
Step #5. Payment options
We look to see if the site offers all convenient payment options and whether it is easy to deposit and withdraw, giving additional value for fast cashouts.
Things we consider:
- Is it easy to use a cashier to deposit and withdraw money
- Do they offer various payment methods
- How fast are withdrawals
- History of withholding players’ funds
Step #6. Customer support
Sometimes you just need to get a quick and reliable answer, and having various support channels and professional help goes a long way.
Things we consider:
- Easy access to support via various channels
- Is support helpful and answers in a timely manner
- Fast and accurate solutions
Step #7. Trustworthiness
We review players’ complaints and investigate the site’s track record for solving arising issues, including protecting players and treating them fairly.
Things we consider:
- Track record of the site
- Complains from the players
- Reviews from our community
Unbiased Poker Sites Reviews
Only after evaluating all of these things fairly we are able to come up with the final rating and share our recommendations with you.
If you want to see where we play ourselves and what we recommend to our friends, check out our list of the best poker sites online.