Online Poker Multi Tabling

By Greg Walker

One of the biggest advantages online poker has over live poker is that you are able to play at multiple tables at a time. Most online poker rooms allow you to open up more than one table window and sit down and play poker at each table simultaneously.

Multi-tabling has become increasingly popular amongst regular online players, who will happily play at 2, 4, 8 or more tables. However, the majority of players will stick to multi-tabling around 2 to 4 tables at once.

The advantage of playing at multiple tables.

The main motive behind multi-tabling is to increase a player’s win rate per hour. If you are a consistent winner at the $100NL table, imagine how much more you could potentially win per hour by playing 2 tables at once instead of 1. How about opening up 3 or 4 tables at once?

It all seems pretty simple, open up some more tables and you could be doubling, tripling or even quadrupling the amount you are currently winning per hour. However, there is one important factor that we have to take into consideration before assuming that things are this simple. We have to take into account that fact that our play will deteriorate for every extra table we sit down at.

How to win more money by playing multiple tables.

Every time we multi-table we can assume that the amount we expect to win every hour from each individual table will decrease. This is because our attention is now going to be divided between two or more separate tables, whereas we would be able to focus all of our concentration on one table if we were not multi-tabling.

It will be more difficult to put players on hands because we will normally be too busy making our plays on one table to analyse the plays of our opponents on another. However, this is not necessarily such a bad thing, because there is still a good chance that we will be making more money overall. Here's an example:

• Profit per hour when multi-tabling.
• When we play $100NL 1 table at a time we win $8 per hour.
• When we play 2 tables at a time we win $5 an hour on each of the individual tables.
• 2 tables total profit = $10.

Therefore overall we will be making $10 per hour multi-tabling instead of $8, which means an extra profit of $2 per hour.

Finding the optimum number of tables to play at.

The biggest problem with multi-tabling for extra profit is finding the optimum number of tables to give us the biggest win rate per hour. If we play one table at a time we will win a smaller amount than if we multi-table, but if we play at too many tables at a time then our win rate per hour on each of the tables could decrease so much that we win less than if we were playing at one table at a time.

When playing at multiple tables, you want to hit the sweet spot of playing as many tables as possible whilst keeping a good win rate per hour to produce maximum profit.

There is some middle ground here where the graph of our win rate per table meets the number of tables being played at to provide us with an optimum win rate. This is usually between 2 and 4 tables for the majority of online players.

When playing at multiple tables, you want to hit the sweet spot of playing as many tables as possible whilst keeping a good win rate per hour to produce maximum profit.

Best multi-tabling strategy.

The best strategy for multi-tabling is to play standard ABC poker, where you bet your strong hands and fold your weak hands. It is difficult to find enough time whilst playing multiple tables to be able to make any tricky or advanced plays. The micro limit strategy article gives a rough overview of ABC poker.

If you try too hard trying to analyses the playing styles of each of the players at the tables you will simply become too exhausted and your ability will deteriorate even further.

Just think of your opponents as robots and play a solid style of poker against them. You are not going to be able to outsmart all of them all of the time, but if you play better than the majority of them every time you sit down at the table, then you will be a winner in the long run.

Playing at multiple tables can improve your game.

Another reason why people decide to play multiple tables at once is to reduce the boredom of having to wait been playing hands. Players can become accustomed to the fast style of Internet play and so the wait been playing hands may become frustrating after a while.

Playing at multiple tables takes a lot of the waiting out of the game, which is perfect for players who always like to be in the middle of the action.

This frustration can sometimes lead to players loosening their starting hand requirements just to subdue the boredom, which is not a profitable way to play. So in some cases it can be beneficial to play more than one table at a time to prevent yourself from entering too many pots and throwing away money on hands that you should never have played in the first place.

Multi tabling evaluation.

Multi-tabling is a great option for players looking to increase their win rate per hour or are looking to liven things up with their online poker. It takes no special skill, nor is it as difficult as you may think to play at more than one table at a time. It is recommended however that you ease yourself in by playing 2 tables at first, and then increase the number of tables as you become more comfortable with playing at numerous tables.

You will also want to try and make sure that you set the tables up in an order across the screen that you feel comfortable with. Poker rooms with a "mini-mode" view of the table are handy for this.

Always try and make the tables as visible as possible on the screen so that you are able to glance over all of them to keep up with the action. By following these tips and practicing you will soon be able to squeeze more from your time spent playing online poker.

Go back to the awesome Texas Hold'em Strategy.

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