How to Build a Viable Poker Betting Strategy: A Complete Guide

Poker is probably one of the few games that you will find at any physical or online casino worth its salt. The combination of skill, strategy, and luck that poker offers its players make it an appealing entertainment both for beginners and seasoned players. If you want to elevate your poker game, you need to develop a poker betting strategy.

Playing poker without a betting strategy isn’t impossible, especially if you are playing every once in a while and with low stakes. However, having a comprehensive strategy and knowing how to adapt it to different situations will make your game more structured, help you manage your bankroll to last you longer, and in general enhance your game experience.

In this guide, we will discuss various tips and insights to build a viable betting strategy for poker.

The Fundamentals of Poker Betting

As with any other game, before you venture into more complex concepts, you should start with the fundamentals. For a poker betting strategy, this means understanding the importance of betting and common reasons behind it, knowing the difference between various bet types and how to use them, as well as learning how to avoid possible mistakes.

Why Betting Matters in Poker

The ultimate reason for betting in poker is to control the pot. This means you keep the size of the pot in check with your actions at the poker table.

By betting you can extract more value, pushing players with hands worse than yours to continue playing. Otherwise, you can protect your strong hand or make others fold. Bets are your way to manipulate the opponents into playing the way that will be the most beneficial for you.

That’s why learning when and how to bet, how to properly size your bets, and avoid common betting mistakes is crucial for any poker player.

Common Reasons for Betting

Before you decide to bet at the poker table, be it a brick and mortar or an online one, always ask yourself the main question first: what is it that you want to achieve with this bet? What action from the opponent will be the most beneficial for you in this instant?

This depends on what hand you are currently playing with. Whether you want them to call, fold, or raise, you will need to use a different betting strategy. Below we will get into more detail about different types of poker bets and how to use them.

Types of Poker Bets and Their Strategic Uses

When you are starting to build your poker strategy, not only is it important to master the mechanism behind every type of bet, you should also know when and how to use them to extract the most benefit for yourself.

Depending on what course of action you would want your opponents to take you will apply different strategies to your own game.

Value Bets

Main goal: increase the pot size without causing your opponents to fold
Bet size: half the size of the pot

The main objective behind the value betting strategy in poker is to increase the size of the pot when you believe you have the best hand at the table. Here we want to get the players with the second best hand to call your bet, thus putting more money into the pot.

Your main challenge here is to not bet too high to scare them off. Of course, the bet size will depend on the specific opponent you are playing with and a lot of other factors, but as a general rule of thumb, betting half the size of the pot is an appropriate bet range. It is still small enough not to scare the players with the second best hand off, but also big enough to protect you against those who could overtake you with a drawing hand.

Bluffing Bets

Main goal: get your opponent to fold when you don’t have a strong hand
Bet size: depends on the situation

Bluffing in poker is a special kind of art. Having an eye for opportunities to bluff during the game is a skill that develops with experience rather than by memorizing certain rules. However, there are still some points that will help you build a successful bluffing poker betting strategy.

• Study your opponents and choose the ones that are more likely to fold against your bluff. It makes no sense to bluff against those who in all probability might call your bet.
• Bluff if your last action in this hand was strong, while your opponent’s was weak. This gives your bluff more credibility.
• Your “story” needs to make sense. If you have been playing your hand weakly until now, your attempt to bluff just won’t add up to the rest of the game.
• Consider your table image. For example, if you are a tight aggressive player and are known to play only with strong hands, your opponents will fall for your bluff easier.
• Don’t bluff too often. You will eventually get caught, and all your subsequent bluffs will lose credibility.
• Most importantly, remember that bluffing is just one tool that you have. Know when and how to use it but don’t build your entire game around it.

Continuation Bets (C-Bets)

Main goal: keep up your strong image
Bet size: half the size of the pot

As the name suggests, the continuation bet carries over several moves and its objective is to maintain the image you build for yourself at the poker table. Two things you have to remember: your poker continuation betting strategy starts before the flop and it starts with a raise.

But what if the flop misses your hand? That’s where you can opt for a continuation bet that will feed into the image of strength you communicated to your opponents pre-flop. There is a high chance that other players have also missed the flop, in which case, if you continue playing strongly, they are more likely to fold.

The size of your continuation bet is more important than ever. By betting half the pot size, you are driving away your opponents who missed the flop. And in case they actually have hit the flop, you won’t lose too many chips. As usually, study your opponents’ tendencies and adjust your game accordingly.

Overbets and Underbets

Main goal: pressuring your opponent into making a mistake
Bet size: over 100% of the pot (overbet), less than 50% of the pot (underbet)

Correct bet sizing in poker strategy is crucial for the game. While for the majority of the time you will be playing within the range of 50 to 100% of the pot, there are situations when overbetting or underbetting can be more beneficial for your game.

You can overbet in a game with a no-limit policy because in fixed-limit and pot-limit formats overbetting is impossible. The mechanism behind this strategy is psychological pressure on your opponents. Two typical situations for overbetting are:

1. You are bluffing and want to make it too expensive for your opponents to call.
2. You want to build a pot after attempting several bluffs that were seen by other players. The trick here is that they might think you are bluffing again and call you. Otherwise, it can also work with the same purpose if you play against a rather loose player.

Most players never underbet even though this strategy can pay off handsomely if used correctly. Some of the situations that will benefit from underbetting are:

1. Your hand is mediocre and can be outdrawn. Underbetting will protect your share of the pot without overinvesting into it.
2. You are bluffing and your opponent has shown a tendency to fold regardless of the bet size.

Advanced Poker Betting Strategies

Once you gain enough knowledge about the more common betting strategies and can confidently use them to your advantage, you can move on to advanced poker betting strategies.

Balancing Your Betting Range

A lot of inexperienced poker players will play an unbalanced game, i.e. they will play certain hands the same certain way in the same situations. A good player will be able to notice the pattern and utilize it to their benefit.

To stay unpredictable, you need to balance your game. Here is what you can do:

• mix strong hands with bluffs
• play different hands the same way
• play same hand in different ways

The concept behind this strategy is pretty simple, but it does require a certain level of proficiency and multilevel thinking. Doing it every now and then won’t have much effect, so keep your balanced range strategy consistent.

At the same time you should recognize the situations when it won’t be necessary. For example, if you are playing against players weaker than you, you don’t need to worry about the balance too much, as they most likely don’t balance their own game and can’t read yours.

Exploiting Opponent Tendencies

Mastering all strategies is only half the job in poker. What’s more important is knowing how and when to use them. For example, bluffing rarely works against bad players who are more likely to call your bet when you want them to fold.

Analyse the playing style of other players at the table. Are they playing loose or tight, aggressive or passive? Each of these categories will require a strategy adjustment on your behalf, so start profiling their gameplay early on.

The ability to adjust your game based on the poker betting patterns and analysis of other players’ skills can be acquired with time and experience and will come in handy when playing against different types of players.

Using Pot Odds and Expected Value

Pot odds show you how many times you will need to win over a certain number of times you lose in order to break even. Practically, if the pot odds are 3 to 1, it means you need to win once over every three times you lose to break even.

Pot odds help you make a decision whether to continue chasing for the card that will make your hand into a winning one. The simple formula for it is Pot Odds = Total Pot / Bet You Need to Call.

Let’s say, the pot is £2 and your opponent made a bet of £1, so now the total pot is £3. You would need to make a bet of £1. Using the formula, the pot odds are 3/1, i.e. 3 to 1.

Another concept that will influence profitable betting is expected value (EV). Expected value is the average outcome you expect to get in a specific poker play if you played it over and over again. While beginner players are often only concerned with the hand they are currently playing, top professional players determine their decisions with expected value in mind.

Here as well, you should take into consideration the level of your opponents. With weaker or less experienced opponents these strategies will be less effective because they don’t have a strategy of their own. With such players it pays off better to use a simple strategy, making use of value bets when you have a good hand.

Common Poker Betting Mistakes to Avoid

We all make mistakes while we learn. However by studying some of the most common mistakes poker players are likely to make, you give yourself a chance to stay alert and avoid them during the game.

Overbetting Weak Hands

We discussed the benefits of the overbetting strategy above, however it also comes with certain risks. Overbetting your weak hand is one of them. If your opponent has a strong hand, they might call your bet and win, in which case you will be losing more of your chips than you could have, if you had sized your bet more appropriately.

Underbetting Strong Hands

Many players are afraid to raise or make an appropriately sized bet even with strong cards in hand. What this leads to is that you don’t get enough value out of your strong hand and waste the opportunity. Whenever you have a strong hand, an aggressive style of playing is more appropriate to get as much profit as the situation can provide.

Misreading Opponent Behavior

If you misread your opponents or choose to ignore their betting patterns and behaviour altogether, this can lead to detrimental decisions on your behalf. If your read on the opponent is incomplete, for example, this is the first time you play against them and the game has just started, avoid relying on this information to make your decisions.

Adapting Betting Strategies for Different Poker Formats

Developing a poker betting strategy is only a start. Using it rigidly in every game isn’t going to be very productive, so you need to learn how to adapt your strategy based on the type of game you are playing. Cash games aren’t the same in style as tournaments, and online games aren’t the same as live poker, so you should also adjust your strategy to what is necessary for the game.

Cash Games vs. Tournaments

One of the biggest differences between cash games and tournaments is that in tournaments you are given a predetermined amount of chips that you can only increase by winning the pot, while in cash games you can always buy more chips if your bankroll allows it.

This leads to most players being more passive in tournaments so that they can last longer in the game. On the other hand, cash games get much more aggressive.

You should always keep this in mind when building your betting strategy for either a cash game or a tournament. The depth of your stack (i.e. the number of all chips you have at your disposal) will greatly affect how you determine your next move in tournament poker. Stack to pot ratio is one of the most important aspects when adjusting your strategy. This calculation compares the size of the pot against the size of your stack.

If your stack is deep (you have many chips), you can be more conservative and wait for a strong hand. But if your stack is short (you have few chips), you are justified to play more aggressively to avoid being blinded out by other players.

Online vs. Live Poker

One of the biggest advantages live poker can give you is being able to observe your opponents’ body language and other tells. Start making note of them early on in the game and use them to your benefit when making a decision on your next move.

In online poker you don’t have this luxury, but instead you can play off of your opponents’ playing style, adjusting your betting strategy to whether they are loose or tight, aggressive or passive. Also pay attention to their betting patterns. They can give you some great clues into what hand your opponent might be holding.

Online games are also much faster than live poker because usually you have a limited time span to make your move. Learn how to make decisions in these conditions, so that you don’t give in to the pressure of the moment.

Developing a Winning Poker Betting Strategy

Developing an effective poker betting strategy takes time and experience but it pays off in the long run. Learn different types of bets, the advantages they can give you and the risks they are associated with, understand when and how you can use them to gain as much profit as possible.

Master detecting, analysing and putting to good use your opponents’ betting patterns and tells. At the same time, learn how to size your bets according to your hand, position at the table, and other aspects.

Most importantly, remember that no two games of poker will be exactly the same, and your betting strategy should be adapted to whether you are playing cash or tournament, live or online, as well as the level and style of your opponents.

Lastly, as any skill, building a successful poker betting strategy requires continuous learning, so keep exploring, analysing other people’s games, and improving your own.