9 Poker Tips You Must Know

Understanding and mastering Poker is no easy feat. Let’s explore some essential poker tips for beginners with PPGAMING

Tight Play is Always Right 

Playing tight is always effective. You won’t lose when playing tight; the only question is whether you win a little or win big. Don’t confuse tight play with weak play. Weak play means only continuing when you hit a hand, otherwise folding. Tight play, on the other hand, means being aggressive, knowing when to bluff or semi-bluff. If you prefer playing loose, and it’s working, keep it up! But if you’re losing consistently, switch to tight play before burning through your bankroll.

Don’t Overestimate Yourself 

From my poker experience, it’s best to work your way up from small stakes to higher ones. If you’re truly a pro, moving up from small stakes should only take you a week. Win at small stakes, move up to mid-stakes, and when you’re winning there, move on to high stakes. If you’re breaking even or losing at low stakes, don’t delude yourself into thinking that the small-stakes players are too random and that you’ll succeed at higher levels.

Learn from Theory 

Theoretical knowledge can be boring, but it’s necessary. I don’t love math, but I got good grades because it’s essential for life. My view is simple: if you’re consistently winning big, you can skip the theory. But if you’re losing regularly, day after day, it’s time to get serious and start studying poker theory.

Be Bold and Aggressive 

You can’t win if you don’t know how to bet or bluff. This partly depends on your personality. If you’re too gentle or passive, poker might not be for you. Poker favors those with bold, decisive personalities.

Patience 

This ties back to Tip #02, where you work your way from small stakes to big stakes. On top of that, there will be days when you win and days when you lose. Some days, you might not get any decent hands for hours. Patience is crucial. It’s an important trait for any job, but especially in poker. Making a living from poker is exhausting and emotionally taxing. You need to develop patience gradually.

Choose the Right Platform, Table, and Position 

This is vital but tricky. It can’t be explained fully in just a few articles. From personal experience: at one time, I made $200 on PokerStars, $600 on 888Poker, and $1,500 on another platform in a single month. Of course, it’s better to focus on the site that makes you more money!

Bankroll Management 

If you have another job besides poker, bankroll management might not be as important. But if poker is your livelihood, always remember:

• Always have enough money to cover living expenses for at least a month.
• Spend frugally, even if you win a $1,000 or $2,000 tournament. Keep your celebration spending under $50.
• Have an emergency fund in case you hit a losing streak for a week, so you don’t need to borrow or sell anything.

Learn About Bet Sizing and Stack Ratio 

These two concepts are challenging. Start learning them as early as possible and keep practicing. One way to understand stack ratio is to play some Sit-and-Go tournaments and apply the M-ratio concept. Bet sizing is even tougher to grasp, but it’s essential to pay attention to it while playing poker.

Continuously Review Hands

The final poker tip in this article is to continuously review your hands.

There are many ways to review hands. At a professional level, you can often remember the details of an important hand while you play.

If you’re a beginner, it’s best to use specialized hand-review software. On some smaller poker sites or mobile platforms, you can use screen-recording software to capture your gameplay for review.

How do you review your hands? First, rewatch your hands yourself. If you don’t see any mistakes, you might think you’re too good! But before getting overconfident, ask yourself: are you winning consistently over the past month? If the answer is yes and you’re crushing the game, then congratulations—you really are a pro! You should consider moving up to higher stakes. However, most people are in the opposite situation—winning small, breaking even, or even losing.

Reviewing your hands is crucial, but let’s be honest—it’s incredibly boring. It’s tedious and mentally exhausting, and watching yourself make dumb plays can be frustrating. If you’ve made it this far in the article, it means you’re serious about poker. So I strongly advise you to make the effort to review your hands. A good rule of thumb is to spend about 1 hour reviewing for every 20 hours you play. 

These are just a few poker tips for beginners. But this is far from everything. Keep following PPGAMING for more poker strategies and guides