The most popular poker room is, and I am saying this without any hesitation… PokerStars. No matter what time you log on, you are guaranteed to find plenty of poker traffic.
PokerStars’ software, available for your iMac, MacBook, or other OSX driven computers, most definitely is one of the most innovative, and best poker rooms out there. Their customer service has won many awards, and has proven to be very quick in answering questions. Cahing out poker profits usually happens the very same day you’ll submitted the cash out request in the poker client’s cashier.
There’s a reason why I’ve added PokerStars to our list of recommended online poker rooms for Mac, as they offer their members a Mac compatible poker client containing the exact same features as their Windows version.
PokerStars Mac Software
The development team at PokerStars is very progressive and innovative, and because of that you can frequently expect updates of their Mac compatible software. These updates are not just security updates, but many times improvements to their poker client. Luckely for all Mac users, both Mac and Windows are always released simultaneously, which can be said of all online poker rooms with a Mac version of their software.
The software is fully customizable. You can choose from a large amounts of themes, you can select the way the card deck is displayed (for instance, black/red, or four colors), and you are also offered the option to upload a custom avatar.
PokerStars also managed to create a lobby that stands out from others, but this is no surprise having the incredible amounts of poker games available. You can us the filter to narrow down the results and end up with only the games you like. Almost every aspect of the game can be filtered – buy-ins, stakes, type of poker game, amount of seated players – you name it.
I already mentioned PokerStars being very innovative. They were the first online poker room having a so called Hand-Replayer, which can be used to replay hand histories. Other poker rooms, for instance the recently by the DoJ shut down Full Tilt Poker, have followed later implementing a similar kind of feature into their poker room software.
Another remarkable feature is the search option to find other active players. Just search for a username, find where he’s seated, and go after his money ;)
PokerStars has a very stable poker environment – client and server. The rare exception when they have crashed was during a mega promotion, when thousands of extra players were logging into the poker client at the same time – but don’t worry, I’m taking about 200,000 or more players here.
Overall, I’d say PokerStars is a highly recommended Mac poker room. It’s easy of use, you can fully customize the looks, there are plenty of games, and numerous interesting promotions. If I had to grade their poker room software, an A+ without a doubt!
Level of Competition at PokerStars
It doesn’t come as a surprise when I tell you that PokerStars houses some of world’s best poker players. They are sponsor of some of the most famous poker players you can think of, of which Daniel Negreanu, Joe Hachem, Marcel Luske, just to name some. Besides home of the well known, they are favorite to thousands of internet pros, but don’t let this scare you though! If you keep it to the lower levels, the lower stakes, you will not see any of these players sitting right next to you.
So it ain’t just pros playing at PokerStars. Some days, you will see more than 150,000 players logged in at the same moment, and quite obvious, amongst them you will find plenty of fish to play against. Are your poker skills more than decent, and are you able to stick to your own level, then you shouldn’t have too much trouble playing profitable poker and winning games at PokerStars.
Tournament players, pay attention! In spite of the fact that higher buy-in (say $100 and up) tournaments house better players, the players field of the big Sunday tournaments – Sunday Warm-up, the Sunday Million, and the Sunday $200 Grand – tends to consist of many recreational players, and wannabee poker stars.
The easiest games at PokerStars can be found at the lower stakes. Weak players can be found in both Sit ‘n Gos, and cash games. Make sure not to exceed your own limit, because you will see numerous multi-table grinders playing limits such as $0.50/$1 at PokerStars.
