Site Navigation & Interface: 9.3/10
Sign-up and Reload Bonuses: 10/10
Transfer: Ease of deposit/withdrawal: 9.9/10
Fees: Lack of deposit/ credit card fees: 10/10
Odds: Fairness and chance of winning against the house:9.9/10
Events: Range of events and special bets: 9.8/10
Service: Questions or concerns met with a quick response: 9.9/10
Trust: Length of company history, strength of reputation: 9.0/10
Total Score: 96%
What They Say: AbsolutePoker is the world's fourth largest online poker destination offering worldwide access to multi-player online games 24 hours a day, seven days a week. AbsolutePoker offers friendly customer service which is always fast, knowledgeable, and professional. Driven by proprietary software, AbsolutePoker also has the most comprehensive, interactive online poker room, providing such features as hand history, stat retrieval, player note taking, chat, locate a player, six table play, and representative image selection. Multi-player games offered include: Texas Hold'em, Omaha High, Omaha Hi/Lo, Seven Card Stud, Seven Card Stud Hi/Lo, One on One, and Tournaments. Established in 2003, AbsolutePoker is licensed and regulated in Canada. AbsolutePoker aims to uphold our Mission Statement: "To continue to be the best and most trusted."
What We Say:
Absolute Poker has created a high-quality poker room, and their site is ergonomic easy to navigate. Absolute Poker is a medium sized poker room where the action concentrates on Texas Hold'em, in particular short handed games. The software is excellent, offering advanced features such as find a player, playing statistics, hand history, etc. Absolute Poker allows you to play at three tables simultaneously. The action at the tables is decent, with high 'viewed flop percentages' at the lower stakes tables. Real money player statistics - July 2008: 4,300-5,500 ring game players during peak hours, 7,500-8,500 tournament players during peak hours.
Absolute Poker Software and graphics
Absolute Poker software is quick and reliable but can be a little annoying at times with so many flashing lights and sound effects. The lobby is easy and practical, with standard design and functions and the private tournament option is a great feature that allows AbsolutePoker players to bring their friends or co-workers together for a private online tournament.
Absolute Poker Ring game traffic
Absolute Poker traffic has not reached considerable volume. Currently play is concentrated on low stakes No-Limit Hold'em ($1-$2 down to 2c-4c games). A majority of the ring games are 6-handed tables. There are typically 2,000-2,300 real money ring game players during peak hours, out of which at least 90-95% are in the Hold'em section.
Absolute Poker Tournament traffic
Absolute Poker has tournament traffic of 4,000-4,500 real money players during peak hours.
Absolute Poker Game variety
Absolute Poker's game variety is fairly standard for the industry. The games offered are Texas Hold'em (1 on 1, PL, NL, Limit, and short-handed), Omaha, Omaha Hi-Lo, Seven-Card Stud, and Seven-Card Stud Hi-Lo. These games range from 6-handed to 10-handed games in No-Limit, Pot-Limit and Limit style. The AbsolutePoker fixed limit Texas Hold'em games vary from $50/$100 down to $0.02/$0.04 although most games are concentrated on the micro-limits. AbsolutePoker's No-Limit games vary from $5/$10 down to $0.25/$0.10. Almost all of the action is focused on the Texas Hold'em tables.
Absolute Poker Rake
Absolute Poker uses a pretty standard 'no flop, no drop' policy, meaning that they do not take out any rake from pots where there was no flop. The rake is at 5% on all types of games (from all limits and number of players) and stops at a maximum of $3.
Absolute PokerSoft competition
The Absolute Poker traffic is at its greatest at the micro-limits where the games vary from fairly loose to plain loose, often with a 'viewed flop percentage' reaching upwards 50% to 60%. This translates to very action packed, juicy games for the small stakes player. You can normally find decent Hold'em games up to the $2-$4 limits and for No-Limit up to $1-$2. At the full ring games and the middle limits around $2-$4, the games become much tighter and will average around 30% or less for the 'viewed flop percentage'.
Absolute Poker Sign up bonus
Absolute Poker offers a 200% sign-up bonus with a maximum of $200. The bonus is added to a 'Pending Bonus' account, making it easy to track your progress and where it will be held and automatically released to your cash account in $10 increments for every 100 points earned (for each raked hand you play you will receive 1 point, and for every $1 of tournement buy-in fee, you will receive 1 point.
Absolute Poker Loyalty bonus
Absolute Poker's "Absolute Rewards Loyalty Program" rewards points for real money play. Points are earned in two different ways; either through hands played at real money ring games, or from tournament buy-in fees. Points are earned as follows: (1) one point is awarded for every hand played in a real money ring game with a limit of $2/$4 or lower that has collected at least the minimum rake ($.25); (2) two points for every hand played in a real money ring game with a limit of $3/$6 or higher that has collected at least the minimum rake ($.25); (3) four points for every dollar in the tournament buy-in fee ($10 $1 tournament would earn 4 points); and, (4) special tournaments that award points to the winners. In addition, once you have played a minimum of 500 hands, AbsolutePoker will mail you an 'Absolute Reward Card' which reportedly gives the holder VIP-treatment at live tournaments, etc.
Absolute Poker Promotions
In addition to the 'Absolute Rewards Loyalty Program' AbsolutePoker offers a good referral bonus. Player's receive $50 once their referral registers, deposits a minimum of $25, and plays in 100 real money raked hands. Aditioanlly, the referrred friend will be credited with $25. AbsolutePoker also offers many good free rolls, WSOP free rolls, and re-load bonuses.
Absolute Poker Support
Currently, AbsolutePoker support is only available via email. Respond time is quick (average 20 minutes), knowledgeable, and friendly. Additionally, their website FAQ section is highly informative and covers most important topics.
Absolute Poker Financial & Transactional security
In October of 2007 Absolute Poker experienced a serious breach in security when one of their executives employed a superuser scheme to defraud players of over $800,000. Absolute terminated the executive, contracted an auditing firm, and has reimbursed affected players losses plus interest totalling over $1.6 million. This breach of trust has cost Absolute an enormous amount not just of money, but in the loss of the poker community's trust. Only time will tell if Absolute an win it back.
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