The life of an online poker pro
Over the past few months, more and more people have enquired about the ease at which it is possible to turn pro. In many ways it is far easier to play poker for a living now than it was when I first started back in 2002. Back then many sites didn’t offer the facility to multi-table and rakeback wasn’t even heard of.
I am aware of some players who earn literally thousands of dollars a week in rakeback. This is how online poker has changed and even though the players at the top levels have become very good, it is still possible to make $50,000 to $100,000 a year playing online without having to play all that high.
If you don’t believe me then take a look at the following player who I know quite well. He plays NL50 and only started playing a year ago after studying NLHE for almost a year. He makes on average around $4/hour per table and he plays eight tables. So he is making $32/hour and then he also gets his rakeback on top and he makes around a $1000/month in rakeback.
He plays full-time which means 40 hours a week so his average monthly earnings are in the region of around $6500 including rakeback. This equates to $78,000/year playing as low as NL50. This may stagger a lot of people but I myself was making $25/hour at NL50 over 65,000 hands when I was six tabling my system earlier this year so I know that it can be done.
These days the life of an online poker pro involves playing numerous tables, getting rakeback and working off sign up bonuses. It also involves using software as well, my favourite tracker of choice has always been Poker Office with its built in HUD. This is another important factor to online play. Your opponents will be using tracking software, table finder programs, buddy lists and existing player databases so you will need to start using this stuff as well.
Over the past few months, many high-stakes pro’s have moved from being high-stakes players who play a relatively small number of hands per week to low stakes and players who now play thousands upon thousands of hands per week. There is a fine line here, obviously a $200-$400 player who is making between $500,000-$1 million a year will not earn anywhere near that amount by multi-tabling NL50!
But he may earn that amount or more multi-tabling $25-$50. I also know of players who are making $150,000/year playing no higher than $2-$4 and $3-$6 NLHE. As an online pro then you need to get certain things in place.
The first is your mindset, you must think professional and act professional to be professional. Also you need to exercise table and game selection. Another factor that may influence your earn rate is playing at different times of the day. You could for example play in the early morning where the network is dominated by weaker players who are playing through a certain skin who have been tempted because of the large sign up bonus.
If they come from a certain geographical area then this could explain why they are clumping together and this can lead to certain games on certain networks being softer at certain times over others. So it can definitely pay to try out different times of the day to see what effect if any that has on your earn rate. Tactics like these can really pay dividends when it comes to making money from online poker. The life of an online pro is far different these days than what it used to be.
By Carl “The Dean” Sampson
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Tags: hold'em, NLHE, online poker, online poker pro, poker, poker pro, rakeback, texas hold'em