Best poker bonuses: which welcome offer you can actually clear

The best poker bonus isn’t the biggest one. Welcome bonuses at poker sites release in small pieces as you pay rake, so what you actually get depends on your volume. At a recreational player’s pace, the PokerStars bonus pays the most: it gives back $1 for every $3 of rake for four months. The $2,000 and $3,000 headline offers at ACR, CoinPoker and WPT Global only pay off for players who pay hundreds of dollars in rake a month.

Below we compare the welcome offers at the five sites we’ve reviewed, work out how much of each one you’d release at different volumes, and cover the free offers, the US and UK versions and the rules that cost players money. The terms are from our checks in November 2026; each site’s own bonus page on Try Poker has the full detail and the claim steps.

Poker bonuses compared

All five offers match your first deposit (WPT Global calls its version cashback), and all five release the bonus as you pay rake or tournament fees. The table shows how much rake each one needs per $100 of bonus, the time limit, and the share of your rake that comes back while you clear it.

Three kinds of offer hide behind the word “bonus”. A deposit match sets aside an amount equal to your deposit, or 150% of it at CoinPoker, and pays it into your cash balance in steps as you pay rake. Cashback, as WPT Global calls its offer, works the same way at the poker tables; the name changes, the mechanics don’t. A rewards pack, like GGPoker’s $100 for $20, is different: you get tickets and other rewards rather than cash, and they’re tied to specific games and expiry dates. In every case your own deposit is real money from the start; only the bonus part waits to be released.

The last column is the one to read first. It tells you how much extra you get back on every dollar of rake while the bonus is running. A 33% return means $1 for every $3 of rake; 10% means $1 for every $10.

How much of each bonus you’ll really clear

The headline amount is a ceiling. You reach it only if you pay enough rake before the deadline, and anything still locked when time runs out is lost. So the useful question is how much of each bonus your own volume releases.

The table works that out for five levels of monthly rake, assuming your deposit was big enough to cover the bonus. For WPT Global it counts only the poker half of the cashback.

Up to about $1,500 of rake a month, PokerStars releases the most, because it combines the fastest rate with the longest time limit. Above that, its $600 cap stops it, and ACR’s bigger match takes over. To release each bonus in full you’d need to pay, every day:

• PokerStars: $15 of rake a day for four months;
• GGPoker: about $33 a day for 90 days;
• ACR: about $167 a day for 60 days;
• WPT Global: $250 a day for 60 days, for the $1,500 poker half;
• CoinPoker: about $667 a day for 30 days.

For a sense of scale, a 100 big blind pot at $0.25/$0.50 typically pays around $2.50 of rake at the 5% rate before any cap. The top two figures are reachable for a regular at low stakes. The bottom three belong to players at mid and high stakes, or to multi-tablers. Our guide to rake in poker shows how rake adds up over a session.

“Share of rake returned” is the bonus’s real size. A $2,000 bonus at 10% and a $600 bonus at 33% both pay you only for play you’d do anyway; the second one simply pays three times as much per hour.

One player, five bonuses

To see what the tables mean for a real player, take someone who plays four or five evenings a week at $0.10/$0.25 and $0.25/$0.50 and pays about $8 of rake a day, roughly $240 a month. Here’s what each bonus releases for them, if they deposit enough to cover it:

• PokerStars: four months at $1 per $3 releases $320. A $320 deposit would be fully released.
• GGPoker: 90 days at $1 per $5 releases $144.
• ACR: 60 days at $1 per $5 releases $96.
• WPT Global: 60 days at $1 per $10 releases $48 from the poker half.
• CoinPoker: 30 days at $1 per $10 releases $24.

The same player, the same games, and the bonus they collect ranges from $24 to $320. None of the big headline numbers comes into play: a deposit of $2,000 at ACR or CoinPoker would leave almost all of its bonus unreleased.

Now double their volume to $16 a day. PokerStars hits its $600 cap, GGPoker releases $288 and ACR $192. PokerStars is still ahead; ACR only takes over at around $50 of rake a day.

How the release is counted

Sites rarely say “$1 per $5 of rake” directly. They count points, and the points hide the rate:

• PokerStars gives 5 points for every $1 of rake in US dollars and releases $5 for every 75 points: $15 of rake per $5.
• ACR gives 5.5 points per $1 of rake and releases $1 for every 27.5 points: $5 of rake per $1.
• GGPoker, CoinPoker and WPT Global state the rate in dollars: $1 per $5, $1 per $10 and $1 per $10 of rake.

Two details change the result. Tournament fees count toward the release too, but only the fee, not the buy-in: at PokerStars a $5.50 tournament with a $0.50 fee earns 2.5 points, so 30 entries release $5. And the account currency matters: at PokerStars, euros, pounds and Canadian dollars need slightly more rake per step than US dollars.

Bonuses for tournament players

Tournament players release bonuses through entry fees, so it helps to count in entries instead of dollars. Only the fee part of a buy-in counts: in an $11 tournament that’s usually $1, in a $5.50 one $0.50.

• PokerStars: $5 is released for every $15 of fees, so 15 entries at $11 or 30 at $5.50. The full $600 takes 1,800 entries at $11.
• GGPoker and ACR: $1 per $5 of fees, so five $11 entries per $1. ACR’s full $2,000 would take 10,000 of them in 60 days.
• CoinPoker and WPT Global: $1 per $10 of fees, ten $11 entries per $1 of bonus.

Fee levels differ between events, from about 5% to 10% of the buy-in, and higher-fee formats such as standard sit-and-gos release a bonus faster per dollar of buy-in. Don’t switch formats for that reason alone: a format with a higher fee also costs you more every time you play it. For a tournament player with a few dozen entries a week, the small, fast bonuses are again the ones that pay out in full.

The best poker bonuses

Each of the five offers suits a different player. Here’s who each one is for.

PokerStars: easiest to clear

STARS600 matches your first deposit 100% up to $600 from $10, and releases $5 for every $15 of rake. You get four months from each deposit, and up to three deposits within 60 days of the first count towards the $600. That’s the longest deadline and the fastest rate of the five, which is why it wins at low and medium volume.

A useful rule: deposit about 40 times your daily rake, and the whole bonus will release in time. Note that the rate is slightly slower if your account is in euros, pounds or Canadian dollars. Full terms and the claim steps are in our PokerStars bonus guide.

GGPoker: best mix of match and free rewards

GGPoker doesn’t use a code. At your first deposit the cashier lets you choose either a 100% match up to $600, released at $1 per $5 of rake within 90 days, or a $100 rewards pack for a $20 deposit. Every new account also gets the Honeymoon for Newcomers missions, worth up to $400 in rewards, and the free Daily Freebie ticket.

For a small deposit, the rewards pack is usually the better pick; for anyone who will pay $33 a day in rake, the match is. See our guides to the GGPoker bonus and the GGPoker no-deposit offers.

ACR: biggest match for high-volume players and the US

ACR matches 100% of a first deposit of at least $25, up to $2,000, released at $1 per $5 of rake within 60 days. The rate equals GGPoker’s; the difference is the size. For a player paying more than about $1,500 of rake a month, ACR releases more money than any other offer here.

It’s also the only one of the five open to most US players. One side effect: the bonus slightly reduces ACR’s flat 27% rakeback while it clears, because rakeback is calculated on rake minus the bonus released. Our ACR Poker bonus page has the deposit-size table.

CoinPoker: biggest headline, slowest release

CoinPoker’s 150% match up to $2,000 is the largest percentage on offer, from a $10 deposit. It releases only $1 for every $10 in fees, though, and gives you just 30 days. The full $2,000 needs $20,000 in fees within a month.

Because the match is 150%, the right deposit is smaller than it looks: deposit about twice your daily rake, and the bonus that creates will release in 30 days. You choose the bonus in the cashier menu at your first deposit; miss it and it’s gone. Details are on our CoinPoker bonus page.

WPT Global: cashback split with the casino

WPT Global returns 100% of your first deposit, from $10 up to $3,000, as cashback, plus tournament tickets scaled to the deposit. Half the cashback is for poker, released at $1 per $10 of rake within 60 days. The other half is for the casino and needs $500 of casino bets per $1, paid only when all of it is wagered.

In regions without the WPT Global casino, the whole cashback goes to poker at the same rate, which doubles its value for a poker player. Deposit about 12 times your daily rake (6 times in a no-casino region). See the WPT Global bonus page.

Free poker bonuses and no-deposit offers

Real cash for signing up without a deposit is rare at the big poker sites. What you can get for free or nearly free:

• GGPoker’s $100 rewards pack for a $20 deposit, the best value per dollar deposited of any offer here.
• The Daily Freebie on GGPoker: a free ticket every day for every account, worth cents rather than dollars.
• Freerolls at PokerStars, ACR and CoinPoker: free tournaments with real-money prizes, some open to all and some for depositors only.
• PokerStars THIRTY: $30 for a $20 first deposit, mentioned in the PokerStars app listing. It wasn’t on PokerStars’ promotions page during our check, so confirm it in the cashier. It’s an alternative to STARS600, not an addition.

Our guides to the no-deposit bonus in poker and building a bankroll with freerolls explain how to get the most from them.

Poker bonuses in the US and UK

US and UK players get different offers from different sites, because the international versions of PokerStars, GGPoker, WPT Global and CoinPoker don’t accept them.

In the US, licensed online poker runs in six states, and each site sets its own offer by state. These were the headline welcome offers during our check:

Release rates and deadlines differ between these sites and change from state to state, so read the terms in the app before you deposit. The FanDuel offer returns 20% of rake while it clears, about $42 a day of rake for the full $1,000. Outside the six states, ACR’s match is the main offer open to American players. Our guide to online poker in the USA lists the sites state by state.

In the UK, PokerStars runs on Betfair and has no welcome bonus; instead it offers Stack+ rakeback of up to 25%. GGPoker’s UK site has its own version of the welcome offer.

Bonus rules that cost players money

Most bonus terms are standard. A few cause real losses every month, and they’re worth knowing before you deposit.

• Withdrawing early. At GGPoker, withdrawing cancels whatever is still locked. At WPT Global, any withdrawal request forfeits all your bonuses, including cashback not yet released. At PokerStars, a withdrawal ends the bonus for later deposits.
• Unplayed deposits. WPT Global’s terms allow a fee of up to 30% on deposits withdrawn without being played through.
• One bonus per person, household or device. CoinPoker limits its bonus to one per IP address, household and device; WPT Global to one per household or device; PokerStars to one first deposit offer per player across all its products.
• Missing the step. STARS600 needs the code (PokerStars support can add it within seven days); CoinPoker’s bonus must be picked in the cashier menu at the first deposit.
• The deadline. Whatever isn’t released in time is gone. A smaller deposit you’ll release in full is worth more than a big one you won’t.

Don’t open a second account or use a VPN to claim a bonus again or from a country the site doesn’t serve. Every site here prohibits it, and the usual result is a closed account and confiscated winnings, not just a lost bonus.

Our guide to bonus hunting covers claiming offers at several sites in a row, which is allowed as long as you have one account per site.

Promotions after the welcome bonus

Once the welcome offer is used up, each site keeps players with its own recurring promotions. During our check in November 2026 these were among them:

• GGPoker: the Honeymoon for Newcomers missions in the first weeks, the Daily Freebie and frequent leaderboards; see our guide to GGPoker leaderboards.
• WPT Global: 30% rakeback every Monday for Pot-Limit Omaha cash players, a Table Starter Boost for whoever opens a new high-stakes table, and random tournament tickets for depositors.
• ACR: reload offers on later deposits and The Beast, a weekly cash-game rake race on top of rakeback.
• CoinPoker: CoinRewards races and random Splash Pot drops, plus the paid 3-Bet Club.
• PokerStars: Stars Rewards chests, earned on the same rake as the welcome bonus while it clears.

Promotions like these change month to month, so treat the list as a sample of what each site does rather than a schedule.

Bonus or rakeback: what matters after the first months

A welcome bonus lasts between one and four months. Rakeback and loyalty programs run for as long as you play, so after the first months they decide how much of your rake comes back.

During our checks, the long-term numbers looked very different from the welcome offers. ACR’s flat rakeback returned 27%, PokerStars’ Stars Rewards about 15% at the entry level, and GGPoker’s Ocean Rewards varied widely with volume. A player who picks a site only for its welcome bonus can lose more over a year than the bonus was worth. Our guides to poker rakeback and GGPoker rakeback compare the programs.

How to pick the right bonus for you

Start with your volume, not the headline. Look at a week of hand histories or session summaries and work out the rake you pay on an average day. Then size the deposit so the bonus releases in full before the deadline:

So a player who pays $5 a day in rake would deposit about $200 at PokerStars, $90 at GGPoker and $10 at CoinPoker to get a bonus they can actually release. If the right deposit is smaller than the site’s minimum, the bonus simply isn’t worth much to you.

A bonus should never be the reason to play more, or at higher stakes, than you otherwise would. Chasing a release deadline usually costs more than the bonus returns. If you’re new, our guide to the best poker sites for beginners covers what else to look for, and best poker sites shows which site is open where you live. Our responsible gambling page lists free help if playing stops being fun.

Poker bonuses FAQ