Hello,

So this is my first post and I don't know if I am doing it in the right location, therefor my apologies if I am incorrect. I do understand that tells are universal and depend on situations and so fourth. My question is, is there typical average tell on online poker, maybe something small to detect tells throughout a session. Thanks!
FYI, I play microstakes, trying to improve my game and do a bankroll challenge at the same time.

It's far more important to figure out your opponent's strategy and use game theory in online games. The only tell online I am aware of are timing tells. A few players bet fast w/ strong hands.

Learn how to play poker well, and don't worry about tells.

You might find a study of an opponent's bet sizing will give clues to his/her hand strength.

Thank you

I've found out a lot of check calling to be a tell that they have a good hand if they check back to you and then call off whatever your bet sizing is. It's annoying but you can get away from hands when check calls are made and especially if made pretty quick calls

yeah, besides time (which can as well be manipulated by villain) im not sure there is any online real tell, there was a time i remember were fake waiting was everywhere and that was the actual tell

Ive been learning a lot the past couple months. One thing I struggle with is trying to figure out another persons strategy. I know you have to sit there and watch them of course, but is there anything that can help? Thanks for the help guys.

Maybe you are looking for something like this 2007 post from a 2+2 legend.

Pokey's Unbelievably Long Guide to Hand Reading.

In certain situations you know villain will be thinking certain thoughts, eg when holding the nuts and trying to determine how to extract max value, or to determine how the river card impacts the situation. If they act so fast that they could not have had time to go through that thought process, it often says something about their hand.
Not masking timing tells is one of the greatest deficiencies you can have in online play imo, especially HU.

You can always look for patterns ... and then you need to decide if they validate any change in your 'normal' poker decision.

I think the timing tells are good, but they can be manipulated. The 'insta-call' (call any button) or especially the 'insta-check' from a PF raiser can mean that a player has an 'easy' decision to make and clicked on a button before action was on them.

Players that bet using the pre-set betting ratios also may be giving off 'easy' decisions within the hand.

Players that normally act fast, but are delayed when the player in front of them changes the action might be considered weak in those spots.

I think bet sizing is the most polarizing aspect of online poker. When you don't have to face your opponent I think it's much easier (and 'accepted') to shove as part of the game. This may lead to a higher bluff frequency.

Another aspect you need to consider is whether a player is playing multiple tables or not. When someone is making that many decisions so quickly it can lead to both no information and much more reliable information.

IMO I think online tells are way less reliable since you don't have the 'back up' of seeing the player watching a movie or getting up to get a drink or taking a phone call 'all of a sudden'. So I'll never say that tells are there for the taking, I will say that you probably can't rely on them as much as a live tell IMO. GL

I hadn't seen this super post. Thanks for this!

Normally, most players will check out of position flops to the preflop aggressor. Most of the time they will instantly check the board without hesitation. Whenever I see that micro 1-2 second hesitation before checking, its an abnormality to their strategy. Almost every time I see a player have a delayed check, they have flopped a monster.

That or a draw that takes a second to think about. The slight pause is a pretty big tell imo, narrows their range down quite a bit if they normally snap do everything else.

Aside from betting sizes my favourite is when they tank for ages OOP and finally check. They're trying to frighten the opponent into checking back by pretending they have a made hand and considering betting. They always snap fold when I bomb after they do this lol

If they got avatarpic of their kids or pets they are more often then not recreational players. On stars, if they have chosen to show vip-status, with only 1-3 stars, they are probably recs too.

These are like other tells mentioned above, exploitable. It would be awesome to sit down on nl500 on stars with a puppy avatar and silver star status

Insta-bet on the river = polarized

Pretty good thread ty for sharing it.