I've been playing on Pokerstars exclusively other than a brief period a long time ago when I played at Party Poker. I definitely noticed that the games were softer at PP, but much preferred the visuals of Poker Stars and figured I could just table select carefully and find soft enough tables.

However, I just spent some time this morning watching tables 20 and 30nl at 888 poker and was blown away by how bad the players were compared to 5nl at Stars. Granted I only looked at a handful of tables, but there were whales at each that I saw.

Why do so many people play at Stars? Feel like it has a reputation as the place where "serious" players play. But why would you want your opponents to be serious players? Even if you can make the argument that you will learn faster playing descent regs, if you can beat 5nl at Stars, why not just play a higher stake at 888 if you have the cash on hand to play those stakes?

I'm specifically talking about playing NLHE cash games, sorry didn't say that.

I guess rake and rakeback are an issue.

Stars are sh**and just own a monopoly on the market atm. Party poker are contenders but they've a history of being money grabbing basta*** aswell.
The win rates for the crushers are still high, there software is by far the best and it's just a great platform to learn/train putting in volume. If everyone flooded other sites, they would die.

Stars is hard but definitely improves your game and enables you to capitalise in other games with your knowledge

I'v tried a few other sites. I went back to Stars as I find their software the most user friendly and the games fill up quickly. I was waiting 15 - 20 minutes at certain times of the day for one sng to fill on one of the other major sites.

I feel this haha. I've just transferred some roll over to Party and Stars feels like a high intensity training camp by comparison.

But yeah software and availability of games is why i still play Stars at all. Most other sites struggle to get a full 6 at zoom tables 24/7 and i can play around 1.5x as many hands on Stars because of faster software. Ive heard 888 is super soft but i just cant abide the software. Party bans huds for reg tables too so theres that, and iPoker is apparently infested with bots (though people say the same about Party).



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I like you mentioned it. Security is a good reason, less bots, less cheating-cooperating players .

i mean the software is the only one that doesnt make me wanna kill myself

Can you elaborate on this? I haven't heard anything about poor security or cheating being more of an issue at other sites than Poker Stars.

I play only at early mornings ~5am, at 888 5NL Snap poker usualy 35-45 player at that time while at stars ~200+ppl. And yes as someone mentioned before at 888 field much softer than at stars