Forums can be a great place to improve your poker game as well as to meet and interact with like-minded people. In particular, forums can give you a chance to take the general ideas you’ve learned through books and videos and to apply those ideas to specific hands, getting feedback from other posters. They’re also a great place to share stories, read stories, and stay up to date on the poker industry.
Here’s a rundown of a few popular poker forums, along with some thoughts on what you’re likely to find in each. Try out a few of them and see if you can find a place that feels like home.
Twoplustwo.com: This is the first poker forum I posted on. It’s one of the most popular and includes lots of strategy discussion as well as tons of discussion about the poker industry, current events, and lots of non-poker stuff. The strategy sub-forums tend to be moderately polite, but there’s a reason they call the Internet Poker sub-forum “The Zoo.” Not always the most hospitable place, but it can be a treasure trove of information for the thick-skinned.
PokerStrategy.com: I have little-to-no experience with the PokerStrategy forums, but they are popular and tend to be less USA-centric. They feature a lot of information on specific online poker rooms as well as some discussion of actual poker strategy.
CardsChat.com: This forum tends to have a little bit less technical rigor when it comes to strategy discussion, but the general tone of conversation is much more pleasant and welcoming, relative to many poker forums. I think it’s ideal for both recreational players and those looking to hang out with other players online, rather than get deep into heavy-duty strategy analysis.
RunItOnce.com: This is one of the best strategy-specific poker forums out there. The discussion leans heavily towards GTO-inspired play, so if you’re unfamiliar with that, then it might not be the best one for you. Then again, maybe it’s exactly what you need! (Extreme simplification: GTO-inspired play strives to find an unexploitable equilibrium strategy that literally cannot be beaten, rather than to uncover an exploit an opponent’s strategy.)
Those are a few of the ones out there. There are a whole lot more. If you’re trying to use forums to improve your game, I suggest posting some hands and responding to even more.