How Do Poker Deposit Bonuses Work?

The first deposit bonus at an online poker site is one of the largest single bonuses a poker player can take advantage of.

For that reason, it’s important that players understand the basic mechanics of a poker deposit bonus.  That way, they can quickly push away the noise surrounding the promotion and quickly evaluate what the deposit bonus is really worth to them.

We’ll get to that formula in a second.  First we have to tackle the fundamentals.  Online poker deposit bonuses have three basic components: Multiplier, Maximum and Clearance Terms.

The multiplier is the match percentage offered by the bonus.  If a site advertises a 200% bonus up to $500, the 200% is the multiplier.  The site will match your deposit with a bonus equal to your deposit amount times the multiplier.

The maximum is the maximum amount of the bonus.  You are, of course, welcome to deposit more, but the site will only match your deposit with a bonus up to the maximum amount.  In our example above, the maximum is $500.  The multiplier is 200%.

Therefore, a deposit of $250 is required to reach the maximum bonus.

TIP: Sites will often have a minimum deposit amount associated with a bonus (sometimes larger than their standard minimum deposit).  Check the terms if it’s not clearly stated in the primary offer text.

Simple enough.  It’s the last component – clearance terms – where things get a little trickier.

So you deposit $250 and get the $500 bonus.  But how do you “get” the bonus?  The room doesn’t just hand over $500 – if they did, too many players would just cash it out and leave.  Instead, you earn – or “clear” – the bonus by paying rake at the room.

Here’s how it typically works.  The room places your bonus money in a separate balance in your account.  Based on a formula (varies by room), they shift money from your bonus balance (a balance you can’t use for play or withdraw) to your real-money balance as you pay rake. For every “x” you pay in rake, “y” of your bonus is cleared.

Sites try to obscure this a bit by using their player point system as a proxy for rake, but it’s easy enough to translate points to rake and get right to the heart of the value a deposit / welcome bonus offers.

An example: FakePokerRoom offers a 200% deposit bonus up to $500.  You need to earn 100 FakePoker Points to move $10 in bonus money from the bonus balance to your real-money balance.  You earn FakePoker Points by paying rake – 5 points for every $1 you pay in rake or tournament fees.  That means you need to pay $20 in rake to earn 100 FakePoker Points and release $10 of your bonus into your regular balance, where it can be used however you like.

That’s how you get the basic formula for determining the value of an online poker deposit bonus:

1. Take the total bonus amount and the total amount of rake you need to pay to clear the bonus.
2. Divide the rake by the bonus amount
3. The higher the resulting percentage, the better the value offered by the deposit bonus.
4. Anything under 10% is low by industry standards.  Anything above 25% is above-average.

This small bit of effort can yield pretty significant returns.  The true value of a deposit bonus is different from site to site, and settling for one that pays a below-average rate just makes it harder for you to build your bankroll.

Are you looking for current no deposit poker bonus offers? Look no further – check out our latest no deposit bonus offers for UK players.

Image credit: JD Hancock / Flickr – Creative Commons Attribution 2.0 Generic