Intro to rakeback

In poker you pay a rake. This is how the poker sites make money. This rake is either:

1) A tournament fee (e.g. a $11 tournament, where $10 goes to the prizepool, and $1 to the poker site).

2) A rake from a cash table. This occurs every hand where there is a showdown, and is a percentage of the pot (e.g. 5%). There is also almost always a maximum amount the rake can be (e.g. $3 per hand). So for example a pot that goes to showdown that is $25, might be raked $1.25 (5%), with the player recieving $23.75. If a pot was say $500, then the rake would not be $25 thankfully, but just $3 because of the cap. The winner of the pot would get $497.

Rakeback is simply the process of giving some of that rake money back to the player

Why Rakeback?

Pokersites really do not care if people win or lose, all their care about is that there is action at their cash tables and in their tournaments. The more action, the more money they make. And this is how rakeback came about. To keep the action flowing requires a lot of regular players, and a good way to attract and retain regular players is to reduce their rake. In previous years, it was common that a site might give certain players something like 30%-60% of their rake back to them. The payment method would vary, but often it might be at the end of the month, so it was a great cash boost at the end of the month.

Poker Rakeback in 2022

Rakeback has changed a lot over the years, with now most of the major sites prefering to give this "rakeback" to all players in the shape of rewards. The more you're producing in rake, the more (and bigger) rewards you will get. Then the site can also use that slightly to their advantage, by say, giving you some tournament entries, or some slots spins, etc...with a hope that some of this money will stay on the site, or encourage certain behaviours (like spending some real money on slots). Finally, by doing it this way, they can give this portion of rake money back with a little more style or excitement (e.g. mystery reward chests), which is good to keep players engaged and interested.

So rakeback is great, as it is effectively reducing what we pay, but be careful that any "casino" type rewards don't lead you into developing a casino habit etc.

Poker Rakeback Deals in 2022

A good site which offers rakeback in the form of many rewards is:

888 Poker