Why is rakeback such a great edge that you should never play a single real money hand without it? In order to understand how it works, first you need to know how the rake works, the source of revenue which is the life-blood of the online poker industry. The rake is a percentage taken off every real money hand played in a poker room. It may not seem like much when you look at it like that (it’s usually around 5% up to a $3 cap), but the more hands you play, the more rake you accumulate. Without a rakeback deal, all that money goes to the poker room. Rakeback makes sure at least some of it finds its way back to your pocket.

Most poker beginners figure they don’t have a whole lot to lose on the rake since they’re not good players anyway and the rake is pad by the winners. That logic is faulty. The rake is paid by everyone who puts money into the pot and here’s why:
The pot itself does not belong to the winner when it is raked. Only afterwards does the software award it to the winner. That is exactly why it is not the winner who pays the rake. Certainly, he pays part of it, because in order to win, he needs to put money into the pot himself, but all those folks who feed the pot with their contributions also pay rake. If you do so much as to call a BB to see a flop, you already pay rake.

Different playing styles can directly influence pot sizes and thus the rake as well. A table full of rocks – which usually produces minimum rake – can be kicked into high gear by a single aggressive player rake-wise. What all this means to you is that regardless of whether you win or lose, regardless of whether you’re a beginner or not and regardless of the stakes/limits you play, you will end up paying rake. It is inevitable.

Rakeback gives you some of that rake back. The wonderful thing about rakeback is, that the more you play, and implicitly the more money you lose to the rake, the more it gives back to you. While high-limit play does yield significantly more rakeback, playing at low limits will also provide you great benefits compared to the size of your bankroll.

Sign up for rakeback today. It gives you a great long term edge, it costs nothing and it’ll stick by your side for as long as you play, because – I forgot to mention that – unlike sign-up bonuses, rakeback never expires.