Betfair Poker Review

Overall 83 Ease of Competition 88 Tournaments 81 Customer Service 85 Software 80

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Please note: Betfair Poker does not accept real-money players from the United States.

Overview
Betfair is a medium-sized poker room that spreads primarily no-limit hold'em games. They recently moved their poker room off of the Cryptologic network and now are a stand-alone poker room.

Bonus
Betfair Poker has one of the largest bonuses available to new players, offering players up to a $600 bonus. To claim this bonus, sign up using the promotional code BFP600. For every 400 Betfair points you earn, you receive $10 in bonus money. Players have up to 60 days to earn as much bonus money as possible.

One Betfair Point is earned for every $.10 in rake or tournament fees paid. This essentially amounts to a 25% reduction in rake for the first 60 days, which is not bad but not that great either.

Promotions
Betfair Poker gives away $1,400 per week through twice-daily freerolls. They also have a very cool promotion called "Threedom Pass". Players who qualify for a live tournament through this site and go on to make the final table will be bought into that same tournament for the next two years on Betfair's dime. "Betfair Points" are earned through participation in real money games. Currently this site is still constructing ways in which these points can be used; so, right now, they have no definable value.

Tournaments
For decently-bankrolled players, this site offers a great selection of scheduled tournaments. Their most popular daily tournament is a $100 buy-in $15,000 guaranteed event. Each Sunday they hold a $250 buy-in $35,000 guaranteed game. Betfair loses points in the tournament scoring for failing to host enough cheap events. Betfair's player base is fairly small; micro-priced MTTs should be made available to lure value oriented players onto the network in hopes that they will convert into medium buy-in players. So with that in mind, this is not a particularly good site for those hoping to find cheap buy-ins and large fields.

Software
While the gameplay is smooth, the color scheme of Betfair's lobby is very hard on the eyes. It is especially difficult to surf the tournaments section of the lobby. The tournament names are very long, which gives the impression of the tournament lobby being cluttered.

When one opens the software, the user has the choice of playing one, two, four, or six tables. The software is designed so that it is easier to multi-table, but the player needs to know that he wishes to multi-table when booting up the software. Otherwise, one would need to close the program and then re-open it.

Competition Level
Betfair's competition is fairly soft. Since Betfair is the largest betting exchange in the world, it attracts sports bettors who are not very familiar with poker strategy.

Ring Games Offered
Texas Hold'em, Omaha hi-lo, Omaha, 7-stud

Fixed Limits: $0.10-$0.20 to $250-$500
NL & PL Blinds: $0.05-$0.10 to $250-$500

Tournaments Offered
Single Table and Multi-Table Hold'em

Heads-Up: $10 to $5,000
Single-Table: $2.50 to $800
Multi-Table: $5 to $250