28/01/2009 In Rakeback Advice, Rakeback News

Rake is how online poker rooms make their money. In online poker, the players play against each other, but the poker room does not make money off individual players’ wins and losses. Thus, in order to make money for providing the website, the online poker room takes a percentage of the pot. This percentage of the pot is called the rake. The rake is most often five to ten percent and amounts to a few dollars per pot. Rake is comparable to a table tax, and rakeback is the tax return.

What is Rakeback?

Affiliates employing rakeback incentive offer a percentage of rakeback to new players when they first sign up to play on a poker website. The affiliate website then calculates the amount of rake that a player contributes over the course of each month, and at the end of the month, the rakeback percentage is returned to the player’s account.

Because each player does not contribute an equal amount to each rake, it is up to the site to decide how the rakeback will be calculated. This is why there are multiple rakeback methods.

Rakeback: The Contributed Method

The contributed method is based on calculating the percentage of rake according to the amount that each individual player places in the pot. The amount of rakeback you receive is directly correlated to the amount of money that you add to the pot. So if you are playing with a $20 pot, and you personally contribute $5 to the pot, your contribution is 25 percent of the pot. Using a 10 percent rake, $2 is taken from the pot. Because you contributed 25 percent of the pot, you receive 25 percent of the rake, which is 50 cents.

Contributed Rake: The Loose Players Method

The contributed rake method is the perfect rakeback option for players who love to get in on the action and play a lot of hands. This is because you are compensated fairly for your increased contribution to the rake. Tight players who play minimal hands and wait for the big one will not benefit as greatly from contributed rakeback.

Most players weigh their success or failure by the size of their bankroll, and with rakeback, you can feel better about your monthly performance whether you win or lose.