For those of you who love to play poker online and live in New Zealand, we may have a tonne of new gambling options waiting for you. You may not realise it, but there are plenty of places here to play online poker in New Zealand.
Better yet, all of these sites offer a variety of different types of poker games, including the ability to play online poker for real money, free poker games, live options, video poker, and much more.
This epic combination of online poker options means you can experience the thrill of playing against other top poker players, against a computer, or just to gain some experience. And all this is achieved from the comfort of your home.
Read on to find out how everyone in New Zealand can have the most fun playing poker online in NZ. Plus, we’ll show you which online poker sites are best for you to play at.
Online poker for real money vs. free online poker
With the internet, come some exciting options for playing poker. For starters, you don’t really have to play with real money if you don’t want to.
You can simply enjoy playing poker for fun or wagering with minimal stakes. Free to play is a great option if you are new to the game and just want to find your way around.
The only downside to playing for free is that you don’t make a profit on it. You should also be aware that some casinos charge a fee for their poker room service, even if you are not playing with real money.
Nevertheless, free online poker is a great way to hone your poster skills, try out a new poker variant, or just have some fun without spending a lot of money.
What types of poker games do you play online?
There are a large number of different poker variants online. Each offers a different game style.
Texas Hold ’em
Poker at live dealer casinos
Five-Card Draw
Omaha High/Low
Caribbean Stud Poker
raid
HORSE
Online video poker
How do you choose the best online poker rooms?
The next step in playing real-money online poker games is to determine which poker game you want to play.
So, how do you choose the best online poker room? In general, online poker tables are categorized based on the bet amount they allow at the table.
This means that you have to choose the right room; a game style with a betting limit that suits your needs, preferences, and budget. Here are a few things to think about:
Profitable poker tables are louder. This is a common expression in traditional poker, referring to the fact that people who are having fun tend to bet more freely. This increases your chances of walking away with a decent profit.
View the players’ bets. If your goal is money, keep an eye on the player’s betting amounts as closely as the poker table’s betting limit. If players stay close to the minimum, chances are you will put a lot of time into it and get a minimal return on that investment.
Learn more about the other players. This applies to poker games as well. Regardless of the setting, you play against each other, not the dealer. Get an idea of how the other poker players are betting and their level of experience so you can predict their moves and make bets in your favor.
Don’t miss any pro poker tips before playing online!
It doesn’t matter if you play poker online or in person; the game can offer some serious thrills. However, if you want to stay ahead of your opponents, keep these five tips in mind to have the best time possible:
Set a pot limit: A pot limit is just a fixed amount that you are willing to spend per day. Set a pot limit and stick to it, whether you win or lose, as this will help you keep track of your poker income and expenses.
Play poker for fun: Profits can be very volatile in the gambling world, but when you play for fun, you will always feel like you have made progress. Practically speaking, if you find yourself becoming anxious or obsessed while playing poker, it’s clearly no fun, and it can affect your ability to look at a situation objectively and see pros or cons, increasing the likelihood that you are going to fail.
Avoid alcohol: Poker can be a great place to socialise and have fun, which means there can be a lot of drinking in a social setting. But this can hinder your ability to win as alcohol hinders your judgement and observation skills. Other players can take advantage of this and encourage you to spend and lose more than you should. If you want to relax with a drink and play poker, a free online poker game might be a better option, or just limit the amount you have to bet.
Make a distraction-free environment for online gaming –Online poker is extremely convenient, which can make this a very attractive option, but it also has drawbacks. If you get too comfortable, you may end up paying only partial attention to the game, keeping one eye on your phone while trying to play at the same time. This can cause you to have a losing streak.
Consider your comfort –Ensuring your comfort may sound a little self-indulgent, but if you plan on playing poker for the long haul, there can be real benefits. Poker often involves a lot of waiting for the peak of your focus. If you have a comfortable set up, you are more likely to be able to maintain focus rather than make quick decisions as you suffer from a sore back.
What do professional players understand about the game of poker that regular players don’t?
Online Poker Tournaments
You may be used to playing poker, but if you decide to switch to playing poker tournaments, you should keep this in mind as tournaments work a little differently than normal poker games.
When you enter an online tournament, you usually have to pay the casino a fee to participate.
This is so you can buy your seat at the table. It usually also requires the purchase of a fixed number of starting chips.
These chips have no intrinsic value, except that you want to finish the tournament with as many chips as possible to collect the pot. Poker players who lose all their chips are eliminated.
How to Play Poker: Rules!
Starting your online poker journey is relatively easy because poker is actually very accessible and the basics are easy to learn.
Really, all you need is a computer and good internet access. When you start your poker journey, you need to find a site that offers poker and where you need to become a member.
It involves providing your personal information so that the operator knows that you can gamble legally.
Essentially, the operator needs to know that you are over the age of 18 and that online gambling is legal where you live. Once your membership has been verified, you can begin your poker journey by making a deposit and getting your poker chips ready to play.
Now that you are familiar with the different types of poker and have learned all the tips and tricks, it is time to dive deeper into the rules of online poker.
What are the key aspects of online poker in NZ?
As you know, the goal of poker is to beat the other players at the table, not the dealer. Depending on the game variant you play, you usually have to make the best hand out of five cards.
There are different hierarchies for these hands, and the poker player with the strongest or highest hand will win the round.
Poker hands
In poker, the hands are as follows:
- Royal Flush: Ace, King, Queen, Jack, and 10, all of the same suit.
- Straight A flush is defined as five consecutive cards of the same suit.
- Four of a Kind—Four cards of the same rank
- Full House—Both three of a kind and a pair.
- A Flush is defined as any five cards of the same suit that are not in a suit.
- Straight: five cards in a suit, but not of the same suit.
- Three of a Kind—Three cards of the same rank
- Two pairs, two different pairs. A pair is two
- cards of the same rank. If
- you have not made any of the above hands, the highest card is played.
The next step is to understand what the different hands can mean in terms of winning. Knowing the strength of your hand will help you in the long run. Here are some examples:
- Starting hands may contain any number of pairs of cards of the same rank. You can also have multiple pairs, as in two 2s and two jacks.
- Marginal hands consist of straights, as in five cards in a suit, or flushes, five cards in the same suit.
- Medium hands usually contain four or five cards in a row, or several pairs at once, such as a Full House consisting of three 10’s and two 3’s.
- Have all five cards in the same suit and in a suit for a strong hand.The Royal Flush is the best hand in the game and consists of an Ace, King, Queen, Jack, and 10 in the same suit. Pick
the best poker table position!
You should also pay attention to your position at the table, as it also affects the way you play. In online poker, there are usually two positions: early and late. These terms refer to what part of the table the player occupies and in what order they play.
- Early Position: Stands in front of both the small and big blind and, as the name implies, goes first. Sits
- on the opposite side of the table, near the button, and plays after early players.
Online Poker Glossary:
A poker word list is important because many slang words have cropped up over the years. To get a better idea of what’s going on, we’ve created this section to give you an edge in the poker world. We’ve tried to find all the important poker words and collected them here.
Poker’s most frequently used words
- Action: Essentially, players spin during a hand. Typically used to wager or raise funds.
- All-In: When a player runs out of chops while betting or calling. The player
- places the amount equal to the last bet to see that bet.
- Check: the player has passed the bet for that round.
- A flush is a poker hand consisting of five cards of the same suit.
- Fold: A player chooses not to go around by placing cards face down on the table. Any bets made to date have been forfeited.
- Four of a Kind: Four cards of the same suit.
- Raise: a wager that is greater than the minimum required to call.This forces the other players to bet or fold more money.
- A straight is a hand that consists of five consecutive cards.
Lesser known poker terms
- Backdoor: Getting the cards you need to make a hand on the turn and river. A bad beat occurs when
- a player with a significant lead loses a hand to the opponent after a flop, turn, or river.
- Bankroll: The predetermined amount that a player must play with.
- Big Blind: The number of chips the player should bet second to the dealer’s left.
- Blind: a position at the table. refers to both the big blind and the small blind.
- Board: five face-up community cards that anyone can use in combination with their own cards.
- A boat is slang for a full house.
- bubble player is the best player in a tournament that is still out of the payout range.
- Burn: Before each betting round, discard the top card.
- Button: The dealer position, named after the plastic disc used in live poker.
- Continuation Bet: The game places a bet after missing the flop and enters the pot with a preflop raiser.
- Draw Dead: A player continuously draws cards that do not yield a winning hand.
- Flop: The first three community cards are dealt after the first betting round.
- Freeroll: a term with two meanings. Either a hand where the player can only split or win the pot, or a tournament at no cost.
- Freezeout: the most common style of poker tournament. Players pay their buy-in, get chips, and play until they run out.
- Full House: Three of a kind plus another pair.
- One possible card completes the inside.
- Heads-Up: A pot or tournament in which only one other player participates.
- Kicker: An unpaired card. If two players have the same hand at showdown, the one with the highest kicker wins.
- Limp is another word for “calling.”
- A loose play style is one that is aggressive or reckless.
- Monster: A very large hand.
- All discarded cards in a hand are referred to as muck.When players fold, they throw their hands “into the mud”.
- According to the board, the best potential hand is nuts.
- Offsuit: When you have pocket cards of different suits,
- A card that will improve your hand.
- Overpair: Specific to Texas Hold’em If there is a pair in the hole, it is larger than the community cards on the board.
- Play on the board: Use the five community cards instead of your hand.
- Only applies to Texas Hold’em.When a player has a pair in his hole cards, he has a pocket pair.
- Position: Your placement at the table, usually sooner or later. This determines the playback order.
- Rags: cards that don’t improve your hand.
- A Rainbow: A flop where no two cards are of the same suit.
- The amount taken from each hand by the house is referred to as the rake.
- A standard poker game where money is bet on each hand.
- The River is the fifth community card.
- Satellite: small buy-in tournament Entry fees will be pooled and seats will be awarded to a higher-value tournament instead of cash.
- Set: A pocket pair that hits the board and makes a three-of-a-kind.
- Showdown: When more than one player remains after the last round, To determine who wins, the other players expose their hands.
- Side Pot: After players move all in on the original pot, a side pot is created. This consists of any additional money bets made by the other players. Only contributing players can win a side pot.
- A Sit and Go: a poker tournament in style. It won’t start until a certain number of players have signed up.
- The smaller of the two blind bets is known as the small blind.The position is defined as the area to the left of the dealer button and to the right of the big blind.
- Split Pot: Multiple players make the same hand, splitting the pot evenly.
- Street: The fourth community card, face up and placed alone.
- The top pair is the pair that has the highest card on the board.
- Travel: Three of a kind.
- Turn: Renamed “Fourth Street.” The fourth community card is placed face up and by itself.
- Under the Gun: The player’s position on the spot whose turn it is first To the left of the big blind,
Poker history
Poker, or at least its European equivalent, has a long and storied history dating all the way back to 16th century Europe. The modern version is probably based on a popular card game from the 17th century.
This game was known as “Poque” in France and “Pochen” in Germany. However, it is believed that both games are derived from the Spanish game Primero. Primero was played by dealing three cards to each player at the table, with bluffing being an important part of the game.
Poque spread through French colonies in New Orleans and nearby regions, growing in popularity. Over the years, it has changed and developed into the game we know today, with the French name adapted to “Poker” by English speakers.
This expanding version, with five cards per player and a deck of 52, became a popular riverboat game, spreading as the boats sailed up the Mississippi River and across the country. Eventually, the American version of poker travelled back to Europe with American troops during World War I.
Poker in land-based casinos in New Zealand
New Zealand is a small country with a population of 4,967,670 people and only 6 mainland casinos open to 18+ visitors. Poker is popular at these land-based casinos, and monthly tournaments are available. One of the most popular poker tournaments, the NZ Poker Championships, is at Chchc Casino.
How do I learn to play online poker?
The best way to learn is to play poker. You can learn basic mechanics quite easily through study or observation. However, a really good poker player knows how to read the other players at the table and bet wisely. These skills can only be developed through experience.
What is the main difference between playing online poker and poker in person?
The main difference between the two game types is probably speed. Since the cards you are dealt online are electronic, the shuffling of decks, the deal of cards, and the deal of chips happen almost instantaneously. This makes the pace of an online poker game faster.
Is there a time limit for decisions?
In online poker, there is usually no limit to how long you can wait to place your bet. However, common courtesy still applies, and if you take long breaks, the other poker players can vote to have you kicked off the table.
How do I receive my winnings?
Online poker works a little differently than your typical poker game. Earnings from an online game usually come in the form of a check in the mail. This may take several days.
How do online casinos make their profits?
To cover the costs, these online organisations will usually collect a rake. This is a standard fee that is deducted from every poker hand played online. They may also charge per player in a tournament. This splits the total cost between players and means the casino never tries to “beat” you because they get paid anyway.
Is online poker legal in NZ?
Depending on where you live, you will find that there are always different gambling laws. With this in mind, you should always look for your region, if it is even possible to play online poker in NZ.
Lucky for you, even if you’re in NZ, you can still play online poker and play at casinos abroad; that’s perfectly legal.
However, you will find that there are also some local requirements. In New Zealand, the 2003 Gambling Act effectively prohibits all online gambling sites from operating within the country. But the ones set up offshore or based in other countries are perfectly legal.
More about gambling laws in NZ!
Is it safe to play online poker in NZ?
Despite this being mentioned in the above question, it is perfectly safe and legal for local players to enjoy online poker better-just make sure the site is from another country. However, you may wonder if it is safe to play on these offshore sites. And this is completely dependent on the specific casino you have chosen.
Due to the setup of the New Zealand gambling laws, any fraudulent activity that takes place on an online site will be governed by the legal system in which the casino operates, which means it is not subject to the New Zealand laws. So, if you want to play poker online, you should choose a site that is located in a legal gambling zone with rules and regulations.
Doing so means that the casino is regulated and must meet strict rules in order to run. This reduces the chances of you being scammed and gives you legal support if something goes wrong.