Absolute Poker Review

Following a scandal after former insiders had been caught cheating on the site’s tables by poker players, Absolute Poker completed a merger with its sister site, Ultimate Bet in 2008 to give birth to the new Cereus network. The software has been overhauled and new security measures have been implemented. Absolute poker now shares player base with Ultimate Bet and it is therefore among the biggest online poker sites in the industry now

Absolute Poker’s software has always been ok. Nowadays, following the creation of the Cereus network, that status can be upgraded to “outstanding”. Graphics are clean though not overly spectacular and gameplay is fast and smooth.

Players can upload pictures as avatars (these need to be approved before they actually show up though). A four-color deck can be used, the chat window can be detached. Multi tabling is available at 10 tables.

One of the downsides of Absolute Poker is the fact that there re relatively few players at the tables outside of peak hours. During peak hours there are about 1,800 players at their cash tables and around 9,000 at the tournament ones. Cash game traffic is unsurprisingly focused on the low limit Holdem tables, but Omaha Hi/Lo and even 7-Card Stud get some traffic as well.

The level of the competition is varied: you’ll need a little bit of luck to happen upon a juicy table.

AP’s sign-up bonus is a 200% one, up to $600. Bonus redemption is dependant on your FAME status level. The higher your FAME status, the fewer credits you need to redeem $1. For example, a Bronze level player needs 16 credits to unlock $1 of the bonus while a Silver level player needs 30 credits, but because of the multiplier he earns credits so much faster than the Bronze level guy that it actually takes him less to unlock the $1 increment.

In order to accumulate status points and credits, players need to play in real money cash games or in tournaments where they receive a status point for every 30 cents they pay in tournament fees.

Absolute Poker features several other promotions too, like their Bad Beat Jackpot, the “Refer a friend” bonus and other several guaranteed prize-pool freerolls. They also have a VIP program to reward their high rakers’ loyalty. Satellites to all sorts of live events are also available, and their $15,000 WSOP freerolls have just wound down.

Absolute Poker doesn’t have live support – which is quite awkward considering how big a player they are in the online poker industry. They do have email though and they do reply in a timely manner.