How We Rate Australian Poker Sites My team of adept poker reviewers have played on and tested every poker site from my list, to find you the best Hold’em, Omaha, 7-card Stud, and Razz poker action on the web, along with the most lucrative bonus rewards for players. Popular Poker Games in Australia. The game selection at Australian poker sites is nothing less than the one at other top notch poker rooms. Australian players have a love of the same types of poker games that you can find elsewhere across the globe. Normal ring games run up to $10/$20 for NL Hold'em, PLO, and PLO-8. In addition, you can play LHE up to $30/$60. There's also a fast-fold type of poker called Zone that lets you fold your hand and start up a new one at another table without having to wait for the previous hand to complete. OnlinePoker.com.au - Australia's #1 guide to online poker in 2020 Compare the best AU-friendly poker sites Play in AUD$$ Get bonuses up to $2000! Secure deposits and withdrawals Every site we recommend has been certified as safe and secure by independent experts such as eCOGRA & Norton. Top 10 Poker Sites for Australian Players! Most of its current poker traffic comes from non-US territories which will suit Australian players, as it. BetOnline Poker. BetOnline is originally a US poker site, but one which accepts Australian poker players who can easily.
For a nation that loves gambling, Australia is a relative late bloomer on the world poker scene. Since the turn of the millennium, however, Aussie poker has started to make its mark on the global stage in a big way. We take a look at Australia’s best poker players in 2019.
Everyone knows about Joe Hachem and his breakthrough win at the 2005 WSOP Main Event, but he isn’t the only one making waves in the world’s most prestigious live poker tournaments. These are the top 10 active Australian poker pros on the all-time money list.
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A former chiropractor from Melbourne’s northern suburbs, Hachem stunned the poker world when he took out the US $7.5 million Main Event at the 2005 World Series of Poker. He dispelled any notions that he was mere flash in the pan a year later at the 2006 Five Diamond World Poker Classic, banking another $2.2 million. ‘Diamond Joe’ has churned out numerous six-figure finishes over the last decade, including at the 2008 EPT Grand Final in Monte Carlo and the $100,000 No Limit Hold’em Challenge at the 2012 Aussie Millions. With over $12 million in career earnings to date, he regularly ranks in the top 20 on the all-time poker money list.
Despite his youth and something of a limelight allergy, Rossiter is now widely regarded as Australia’s best live poker player. At 22 he announced his talent with a third-place finish in the 2011 Aussie Million Main Event, and by 24 he was one of the nation’s most successful poker pros after pocketing some US $3.2 million at the 2013 GuangDong Asia Millions. He is a prolific deep runner on the Asian and European poker circuits, so much so that he has already cracked into the all-time top 100 for career poker earnings.
While he may not have a seven-figure payday to his name, the one they call ‘Iceman’ is as consistent a performer as they come. No Australian has collected more World Series bracelets than Lisandro’s five, two of which came at WSOP 2009 in the Seven Card Razz and Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo events. A versatile player who continues to record final-table finishes across several disciplines, the West Australian highlighted the quality of his all-round game by winning the Aussie Millions H.O.R.S.E. title in 2014.
Some say professional poker is now a young man’s game, but nobody told Mel. ‘The Silver Fox’ was the first Aussie to win a WSOP bracelet, taking out the Seven Card Stud event in 1989. He repeated that feat in 1997, when he also finished third in the No Limit Texas Hold’em World Championship. But Judah has produced some of his best work after the turn of the millennium, including a career-high US $579,375 win at the 2003 WPT Legends of Poker Main Event and victory in the H.O.R.S.E. tournament at Aussie Millions 2013.
Steicke’s pro poker career got off to a flying start in 2007, when he banked six figures with a third-place finish in the No Limit Hold’em High Roller Event in Macau. Two years later he won the 2009 Aussie Millions Main Event, which earned him a career-best AUD $1.2 million pay packet. He has finished in the money at Crown Casino’s top-drawer tourney three times since, reaching the final table in 2011 and 2014. Steicke’s career earnings at the time of writing exceed US $3.4 million.
Perhaps better known by the handle ‘MONSTER_DONG’ and variants thereof, Karamilikis is Australia’s most prominent online poker pro. While live poker earnings of over US $2.5 million are nothing to sneer at, his haul of more than $5.9 million in Web-based tourneys puts him among the country’s all-time best earners. The South Australian has claimed top-three finishes in more than 250 real money poker events online, with over 100 outright wins. His best live hold’em result to date came in 2012, when he scored a US $478k return at the ACOP High Rollers Event.
The overwhelming majority of Gorr’s career earnings were made at the 2011 Aussie Millions NLH Main Event, where he stunned a talent-packed final table to claim first place and AUD $2,000,000. It’s been slim pickings since then for the stalwart Victorian, whose only cash of 2015 was a 23rd-place finish at the Star Summer Poker Series in Sydney.
Levy burst onto the scene by winning AUD $1 million at the 2007 APPT Main Event in Sydney – just the second cash of his then-fledgling career. He also won top prize at the 2011 ANZPT Main Event and has reached the final table in the main events at both the Aussie Millions in Melbourne and the EPT Grand Final in Monaco. Consistent strong runs in minor tournaments and recurring midweek events have taken his career earnings to well over US $2.2 million.
Like Mr. Gorr, Krost made the bulk of his US $2.1 million live poker winnings with a victory in the top card at the Aussie Millions. His came a year earlier, in 2010, when he outlasted the likes of Denmark’s Frederik Jensen and Canada’s Sorel Mizzi. Two years later he put in another big performance at the 2012 Tournament of Champions to claim top honours in a field containing stars such as Gus Hansen.
One of the few top-line Australian poker pros who has spent most of his career to date on home shores, Neilson is a top prospect with plenty of runs on the board already. He won three live tournaments in 2015, two of which paid six figures, and enjoyed a strong start to 2016 with victory in the $5k No Limit Hold’em at the Australian Poker Challenge in Sydney. Along with Rossiter and Hachem, he currently ranks among the top 500 players in the Global Poker Index.
Want to try your luck at poker online? Head to Mucho Vegas, our top-rated casino site for players from Germany, which has a range of RNG (random number generator) poker games to choose from, which can be played for free in practice mode or for real money bets.
On March 2017, the Australian Parliament voted to exclude online poker in the country, and the bill was passed in August 2017. However, this doesn’t mean you won’t be able to continue playing all your favourite online poker variants.
Despite the departure of PartyPoker, PokerStars, and 888Poker, along with other leading online poker establishments, there are still several online poker sites willing to take a chance by providing poker games to online players in Australia.
Most of them are honest, upstanding operators, but as we are sure you can imagine, there is still a handful that are less than reputable. Therefore, we here at Top10pokerwebsites reviewed the existing online poker sites, still catering to Australians, to identify which of them provide the best online poker experience so that you don’t have to.
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Contents
The Australian gambling laws are quite clear: There will be no penalties attached to online poker players engaging in online poker in Australia. The bill was passed solely for the online organisations that offer their poker products that will be subject to prosecution actions.
This means, as an online poker player residing in Australia, that you can continue to participate in online poker without any fear or worry that you’ll be prosecuted. The Australian gambling law is very similar to U.S legislation when it comes to online poker, and no player has been convicted, prosecuted, or indicted while playing online poker as a citizen in the U.S.
According to the popular stereotype, Asians love gambling. While this might be true to some extent, the citizens of China can’t hold a candle next to Australia when it comes to gambling. Australia has some of the biggest gamblers in the world with an estimated loss of $1,000 per adult, annually. Looking at things from an online perspective, the gambling scene is growing at an enormous 15% year-over-year.
For several decades, the Australian laws regarding gambling have always been on the liberal side of the equation. A number of land-based casinos are spread across the country, with most of them offering electronic and table games alongside poker. Video poker machines and slots (known is Australia as ‘pokies’) are considered the most popular and is an extremely popular sight in clubs and pubs across the nation.
For betting on sports, the Totalisator Agency Board allows both fixed-odds bets and tote wagers to be placed. There are more than 3,000 retail TAB outlets spread across Australia, and the locations range from isolated regions to rambling metropolitan areas. Bingo, or ‘housie’ as its locally called, is also available just about everywhere.
Betting at online poker rooms, and online casinos were supposed to be eradicated thanks to the 2001 Interactive Gambling Act. However, penalties were imposed against gaming operators and not against the players. This allowed the citizens of Australia to continue playing with anyone that accepted their wagers and believe us; there were loads of offshore poker sites that were eager to flaunt the law.
The Australian gambling regulation is achieved on two levels. The Central government ensures an active role in both amending or adding to relevant laws and the supervision of the gambling hobby. Regulation is also at the territorial and state level, with numerous regional authorities that carry out these functions.
Below is a list of every organisation involved in gambling regulation in the country of Australia, along with each region where they hold authority:
In 2001, the Australian Commonwealth Parliament passed the Interactive Gambling Act, and this legislation targeted online operators to protect the general public from harmful effects surrounding gambling. While Australian residents were still able to gain access to online casinos and poker sites without any fear of legal consequences, it turned out to be an offence for online operators to provide virtual gaming for real-money to anyone inside the Australian borders. It also banned advertisements relating to real-money online games across all platforms of media.
These laws were applied to any interactive gambling services, regardless if they were situated in Australia or internationally. It’s worth mentioning that sports betting was not part of the restrictions, and Australian-based gambling operators weren’t allowed to provide their services to any overseas nation that was listed as ‘designated country’. In fact, online lotteries were also exempt, provided that the operator obtains the required license and wasn’t offering virtual scratch cards. The IGA was supposed to eliminate in-play sports betting, as it was considered to be one of the extreme temptations for gambling problems. However, it wasn’t truly effective, as several loopholes allowed operators that were licensed in Australia to continue to provide such wagers.
After the 2001 Interactive Gambling Act was passed, most parties seemed to be content. A decade managed to pass without any major alterations, and even a review of the IGA in 2011 only resulted in a selection of recommendations. However, in 2016, things started to change. Alan Tudge was the newly appointed Minister of Human Services within the Australian government of Prime Minister Turnbull and was given the unnerving duty of bringing the $20 billion gambling industry of the nation in line with modern standards. Alan Tudge approached his task with a passion, making most in the gambling industry quite anxious, and legislation was passed within the same year. During the first half of 2017, the revisions were passed into law, and included:
In 2016, The Interactive Gambling Bill was introduced and was successfully passed by the Senate of Australia in March 2017. The bill is expected to be approved in May during the next governmental session. Unless something unexpected occurs, it will become the new law of Australia a few weeks later.
The Interactive Gambling Bill has been taken very seriously by the gambling industry, and several online operators have already started withdrawing with the Australian market. The list includes Vera&John, PokerStars, 32Red, and 888Poker to mention a few. Looking at the IGB, here is what you can expect to come into effect within the foreseeable future:
There’s nothing in the Australian law that makes it illegal for citizens of Australia to use or access online poker sites. Therefore, it’s legal for the residence of Australia to play poker online if they choose. There are several overseas online operators that gladly accept customers from Australia, so there’s a fantastic selection of online poker sites to choose from. There are also plenty of licensed sports betting websites available for Australians, too.
Should you encounter any problems, you won’t be able to receive any assistance from your local authority. Therefore, you are basically on your own. Fortunately, this isn’t a major problem, as most online poker rooms and online casinos are licensed and regulated by other gambling jurisdictions. Keep in mind, however, that some of these jurisdictions are more specialised than others, so it’s always vitally important to do some homework before registering a new account at any online poker room and making a deposit.
Another thing worth mentioning is that Australia, when it comes to gambling, has favourable taxation laws. The act of wagering (whether betting on the lottery, slots, sports, poker or anything else) will be considered a recreational activity, and any winnings won’t be subjected to taxation. This is one key area where the gambling laws in Australia are far more superior when compared to just about any other country in the world.
In this final section of our in-depth and very informative guide to playing online poker from anywhere in Australia we are going to be answering lots of questions that new players from Australia will have.
With that in mind below you will find the top 10 most asked questions Australia based online poker players are seeking the answers to and underneath each of them you will of course find the answers to those questions.
You will certainly not want to be forced to play in any alien currency that is not Australian Dollars when playing real money poker games online or when you are taking part in any online poker tournaments. As such we are happy to let you know that you will be able to set your online poker site account to use AUD at any of our featured online poker sites.
That does of course mean your deposits and also any withdrawals you make of any winnings will never see you having to lose a percentage of those deposits or withdrawals for Forex related fees and charges.
Make sure therefore that any online poker site you do sign up to and end up playing at does indeed give you the option of selecting Australian Dollars when you register as a new player, if not then do not sign up to those sites as you will be losing out every single time you make a deposit or make a
withdrawal from that account!
It will be dependent on just how quickly you will want to get paid your winnings form any Australian online poker site in regards to which will be the very best banking option you should select.
For when you use credit or debit cards or select a bank wire or bank transfer as your preferred banking option there can be a few days delay in your withdrawals reaching your account when you have requested a winning payout.
We would strongly suggest that you consider using a web wallet to keep all of our online poker playing bankroll in, for when you make a deposit or a withdrawal using a web or an e-wallet you will find your deposits are instant and your withdrawals reach your chosen web or e-wallet much quicker.
However you are free to pick and choose just which banking option suites you best so do take a look around at our banking section of this website for a round up of the available ones.
Whilst some poker sites only have one single currency offered to their players many poker sites will be multi-currency poker sites, so when playing at the former you will be forced to have to play in the poker sites preferred currency.
All Australia based online and mobile poker players do have a huge range of different poker tournaments that they can take part in and enter, both mobile and online Australian player friendly poker sites have plenty of tournaments up and running throughout the day and night.
If you are living in Australia and want to find out just when any poker sites poker tournaments are up and running then visit the poker sites websites and take a good look through the poker tournament schedule as that will enlighten you on how every poker tournament has been structured and designed and when it will be going live too.
There is also going to be very unique features that will be available to you at some online and even mobile poker sites and that feature ill allow you to set up your own private poker games and private poker tournaments too.
So if you do want to play poker games or set up poker tournaments that only your friend or family members will be able to enter then make sure you checkout those poker sites offering this feature of which we have several listed throughout our website!
You will find pot limit games and no limit poker game variants on offer at all of our featured poker sites and as such it doesn’t really matter whether you are a high stake play or a low rolling poker players there will always be more than enough poker games available to you.
In fact, the cost of entering some of the many different poker tournaments are suite varied ranging from free to enter freeroll tournaments to tournaments that have some mega sized entry fees, so there will be plenty of them that suit your bankroll and your playing style too!
One of the many advantage of playing poker online is that you are going to be able to play for free and access a range of free play poker tables and poker tournaments, which you cannot just sit there are watch a poker game or poker tournament in full flow.
Unless you are actively playing in those games or tournaments by playing or fee you will of course be able to experience firsthand how the games play and pay, so make sure you at the very least sign up and play for free at our fat rued Australia player friendly online poker sites!
You will also find that some poker sites will generate and issue you with a random username when you sign into your poker site account and that will ensure you can flit and move around he poker tables and play in different poker tournaments without other players being able to identify you.
So if you want to have the peace of mind in knowing your poker game play will not be tracked and you will not be identifiable by other players opt to play at any online poker site available to Australian poker player than use anonymous usernames and tables!
As you are going to find plenty of no limit poker games on offer to you then if you are something of a high stake poker player you will always find enough high limit, well in fact no limit poker games on offer. Just make sure before you do play for very high stake levels you know how to play the poker game variant you have chosen optimally and with the best strategy in place!
Australia based players who sign up to any of our top rated poker sites are going to discover that they are not only going to be able to play poker game variants and also enter online and mobile poker tournaments at those sites for all of them also have available a range of different poker side games too.
If you ever fancy playing pokie games or roulette games for example alongside your chosen poker games or poker tournaments or any other type of casino based games those games will also be available, so you can have plenty of additional gambling opportunities at each of our selected Australian player friend online and mobile poker sets too!