Taking Notes In Online Poker

Making observations and taking notes is incredibly important in online poker games. There is so much information to gain at the poker tables; taking notes is essential. It is nearly impossible to remember every single action made by every player, and it is very difficult to log it all by notes, but you should try to get as much as you can. Poker is a game of information and taking notes is one of the most valuable tools at your disposal.

If you are single tabling online there is a large amount of information available in every game that you play. You should be paying attention to every single showdown and recording the information about each player’s hand and how they played their hand. You should also be paying attention and logging all kinds of other information for non-showdown hands, such as bet sizes, over-bets, and the percentage of hands your opponents are playing or raising. There are some excellent tools out there that can help with this, such as Poker Tracker and Holdem Manager, but nothing can substitute good note taking.

Notes are not only important for the current game you are playing but if you come across that player again, you will have extremely valuable information on him. Most players do not take notes, so you will have an even bigger advantage at the smaller poker rooms where it is very common to run into the same players over and over again.

Taking notes in live games is a double edged sword. One negative is it can have a significant impact on your image, hurting your chances of getting paid off. However, it may help you get a fold when you need it. Also, many of the recreational are just looking to have a good time and they feel more comfortable losing their money in an apparently non-competitive environment. In some cases it may cause your opponents to play better or even leave table. The positives are the same as in online poker. However, taking notes isn’t as necessary when playing live, because the action is so slow that you have time to register and remember more.

Taking good notes is a process that is learned thru experience; the more notes you take, the better you get. Also, you can learn from others by reading articles or watching videos. I still have room to improve in my note taking (especially during ring games) and watching other player’s videos is on my to-do list. With that said, I think my notes on this player might be helpful to others. It shows what to look for and some examples of abbreviations. This example was a $10.70+$1 Double Shootout on PokerStars started with 6 players at the table, 1st place at the table moves on to the final table. The final table had $652 in prizes. The heads up portion of this tournament ended up being a marathon and I took more notes than usual.

My close observation and note taking allowed me to formulate the correct strategy. As you can see note taking is essential for any serious poker player.

An example of In-Game Notes:

“$11.70 Double shootout…very agg and loose pre, using big overbets…check calling the open ender on turn, then hits and check raise all in huge overbet…raised JJ pre unopened from 30 to 210…seems to get tricky and trappy post…not very aggro on flop or turn….too loose preflop sometimes…but he does fold the sb a lot, he just calls too many preflop raises HU from both spots….doesnt bluff, his one attempt at a bluff was 200 into 2100 on the river…way too passive with his KK QQ AA hands…very passive post whenever he hit 2nd pr…his all in over-bets pre are ridiculous…hes not adjusting to me well…the river is a good time to steal from him with a min bet but dont do it with a wet board, cuz he checks with pairs so often, and he is willing to call light…check calls his draws it seems, and check folds them on river with insta-clicks…folds his sb way too much…extremely passive post flop…3 different times he checked down kings on every single street, an ace hit on the turn twice, but still a terrible play…doesnt bet his marginal hands in position or out of position….marathon HU match, we started with him having 6500 chips and me 2500 and bb only 100, took me forever to switch stacks… starting to shove the button more as he gets down to 2k in chips with 200 bb and ante of 25…he makes weak plays like calling K5o for 4xs in bb for half his stack and first time i had raised in about 10 hands….the key to this guy is nickel and dime him post flop, he is ez to read post and folds too much, never bluffs…now he claims hes tired and shoving every hand…called all in with K5 getting impatient…”