One of the great things about online poker is the vast selection of places to play, over literally hundreds of sites and tens of thousands of tables.  The real key to being successful at online poker isn't even poker skill, although that does help, it's actually knowing where to play and what games to play.  Imagine two situations.  In the first you're a highly skilled online poker pro playing at a table with other highly skilled online poker pros.  You could be among the top 10 best online poker players in the world and still be the worst player at the table with expectations of losing money over time.  Or, you could be a halfway decent player sitting at an online poker  table with drunk fools who don't care what cards they play as long as they get some excitement, where you can clean up pretty easily.  Which situation would you rather be in?

I've been around online poker since it first started almost 10 years ago and back in the old days it wasn't really that important where you played since the players were so bad everywhere.  Nowadays there's a lot more decent online poker players who have read a few poker books and aren't playing as loose as they used to, and although they really aren't that good especially in comparison with students of my site, it's still better to play in looser games where the competition is weaker.

Back then it was more a matter of finding sites which are loose overall, but that has changed somewhat.  You find more of a variety of good and not so good games now at various online poker sites and the trick now is to know which sites have enough good action to make it worthwhile to play there.  There are some sites which historically haven't been the easiest sites to win at but now due to their sheer size have a lot more loose games than the average site making them a real good bet now.  With the smaller sites you want to make sure there's enough good online poker action to make it worth playing there.

Another consideration is along the lines of the types of games you like to play.  Good online poker players will be well rounded and be able to do very well at limit and  no limit cash games, sit and go tournaments, and multi table tournaments.  Some sites may be great for some and not others and to the degree that you are comfortable with different types you will want to check them out at each individual online poker site.  Of course it helps to be pointed in the right direction and we will do that for you.

As well, for various reasons, mostly due to different personal playing styles, some players will do best at one site and another at a different site.  I've played personally at all the sites I recommend along with many others and have had countless students sample many sites and there is quite a bit of variation among which is best and easiest to win at for each particular online poker player.  There is only one real way to tell this and that's to try out various online poker rooms.  Online poker players tend to find a site that they like and become married to it so to speak and that's not the best way to go.  You don't know what you may be missing on the other side of the fence and the only way to know for sure is to go there and find out for yourself.

You don't just want to go anywhere though and you want to stick to not only easy sites to win at, you need to stick to reputable and trusted online poker rooms where your money is safe as if it were in the bank and they also provide excellent customer service.  The sites I recommend are all of this nature and you can rest assured that you're in good hands. 

Another thing that you want to be aware of, especially if you're newer and have a smaller bankroll, and even if your bankroll is fairly large, is the power of poker bonuses.  If several thousand dollars extra doesn't interest you then you may not care about this but I haven't met a poker player yet that wouldn't take this extra cash while not having to do anything else really but play the poker they already would be playing.  Put it this way.  You're going to be playing poker anyway so the difference is you're making this extra money based simply on your play or you're not.  To make this even better, you get to try a site which at worst is a good place to play and it even may turn out to be your favorite and most profitable.  Plus it's a very good idea to have accounts at multiple online poker rooms, the ones you like and do best at that is, which adds to your game selection possibilities, giving you a lot more selection at any one time which means more juicy games and more profit for you.  If you've checked out Poker Edge in my software recommendations, they are even working on an exciting new development where the software can find the best and juciest online poker games across several of our recommended online poker rooms and at a glance you'll see the best games out there for each type and level of game.  This is a work in progress and they are planning on incorporating more and more top poker rooms into the program and obviously to benefit from this you'll want to have tried out the poker rooms and have accounts at some or even better many of them.  They are also working on a very exciting update where in addition to their huge array of stats they will be allowing customizable stats and let me tell you I have some fantastic ones which blow away anything out there now which I'll be providing on my site once the update is up and running.  If you haven't checked out this awesome poker software program then after you're done checking out my top recommended poker sites that follow, click on the software tab on the top of any page and visit that area.

Yet another issue is one of marketing, and depending on a poker room's budget and popularity, players are attracted.  You don't want to rely on this too much as there are some very popular sites which are also very good sites, but some are less so, and there are also some places which you may never have heard from that get great traffic, have great games, and are excellent places to play at.  From among all the sites out there I've selected for you what I consider to be the best to at least try based upon my own experience and more importantly from the feedback and results of the many students of this site over the years.  There's not one of these online poker rooms that I wouldn't recommend at least trying and collecting the bonus from.  You don`t just want to go there and play a few hands of course, it takes a little time to get a feel for the place and the time you`re collecting the bonus money is the minimum you want to spend there and besides why not take the money they are giving you for trying it out.  Then after that you can try another site if you wish although you always want to go through my recommended sites page to ensure you get the best bonuses. 

In addition I'm always available to provide personal recommendations and personal bonus programs to my students and you can either post your personal details or questions on our forum or email me personally.  I'm always happy to hear from you whether it's for poker room recommendations, questions you may have, or anything else related to poker.  It's best to use the forum if it's of a general nature that other people may benefit but if it's a more personal or private matter then email me directly.

So have a look at the reviews and when you're ready to decide which room you want to try, all you need to do is click on the review or the button associated with the room which will not only take you to the poker room but will automatically ensure that you get the best bonus from then even if you end up coming back and opening up your account later.  No need to enter or remember bonus codes!

Now it's time to move on to the list of recommended online poker rooms.