One of the secrets at winning online poker games is to pick the right targets to go up against. The first thing you want to do when you sit at a table is figure out who’s a fish and who’s a shark. A poker fish is a bad player, who often loses a lot of money due to poor plays. Generally, an experienced player will have more chances of beating inexperienced players. The secret to online poker success is therefore largely related to going against the right person at the right time. So how do you spot a fish? Well, grab your fishing pole because I’m about to teach you about simple signs of fish activity.

Watch the discussion

Be on the lookout for comments like “I’m not getting cards”, or “I can’t hit flops”, or “It’s about time I get something” or any other sign of frustration. Some people just can’t help it, when things don’t go their way they vent. Take that as a cue that this player will likely be bluffing and taking huge risks in the next few hands. There’s also comments like “Hey, how do you …” or “This online poker thing is cool” because such comments identifies newbies. And newbies tend to make stupid plays! Make them pay! (Besides, you’re doing them a favor. How else will they learn?) Might as well make them work for that pokerstars bonus! Also, don't forget to grab your pokerstars code before depositing.

Auto Checks/Calls/Raises

Online poker rooms have check boxes that allow players to instantly call, raise or fold. Keep track of who’s using them and who isn’t. When someone always auto calls pre-flop all the time because they like to see cheap flops, but suddenly on a new hand they take a more time and raise, that’s a cue that they may have a strong hand. Remember that we are creatures of habit, hence we tend to play the same way all the time (which is bad in poker!). When you see someone who’s consistently doing the same plays, but all of a sudden their behavior changes, that’s a cue that something in their hand is abnormal. Why else would they break the pattern? The challenge for you then is to figure out is that means strength or weakness, but my point is that you need to identify unusual play patterns.

Taking time and apologizing

Someone who’s consistently slow to play, and saying “sorry for the wait” is someone who’s distracted. Usually, that means they are playing another game at the same time, they are on the phone, or busy with something else. The point is that they are not paying attention on the game. That means they are probably playing cards and making decisions based solely on what they have on their hands, which is how we all played when we first started out at poker. You can be sure that this player is not analyzing every single move made by other players. How can they when they’re not even paying attention to their own screen?

Running out of chips/reloading

Someone who’s how aggression and is running out of chips will often push all in with nothing when they are the small stack. Often, when people run low on chips, they get impatient and they want to bounce back fast to where they started. This is often your ticket out. Don’t give them much credibility and call if you have a descent hand. Also watch for people who reload frequently. That simply means they are bad players with a lot of money to spend. If you are consistently reloading, then you are obviously not playing good poker. Watch for these individuals because they can become lucrative opponents.

There are many other factors to consider when playing online poker. I gave you a few examples to get you started, but I will let you in on more online poker tells in a future poker article. Start looking out for these scenarios. As an exercise, all I want you to do is to tag players as “fish” or “sharks” based on your observations. Then watch how they play, and how much they win/loose and how much luck is a factor in those outcomes. It doesn’t matter if you were involved in the hand or not, just take notes and try to see if you tagged your players correctly after watching them play for a while. If you can master the art of profiling your opponents, you have the potential to do well in poker. If you can’t tag your opponents properly, you’ll never be a great poker player.

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Online poker tells