Why is poker streaming a thing?

If you want to up your poker game, you should watch someone play poker. At least, that’s what poker streaming is all about. Playing poker online isn’t a new phenomenon, by any stretch of the imagination. Whether it’s via online casinos or live chat rooms, playing poker with other players across the internet is pretty much the norm. But – watching other players play in online games – not so much. Recently, watching other people play poker or ‘poker streaming’ has become a huge thing in the online poker community.

Poker streaming is actually a run-off of a much larger event – casino streaming. Now, we don’t have the time to go over exactly how casino streaming started and where it’s at today. For that, you can head over to casino review site Casinos.co [3] where give an extensive explanation of all of that in their casino streaming guide [4], along with a couple of tips and tricks of who to start watching to get you started.

The poker streaming community specifically is smaller, but it’s still very strong. Poker lovers have always been some of the most dedicated players in the industry, and even though a whole lot of other things have changed, that single fact hasn’t.

Why watch poker streaming?

Learning how to play poker is an entire business. Up until a few years ago, the only real way of getting to know the ropes before sitting at a table (virtual or physical) was by studying books and then opening a real money account. It could easily have cost you anywhere in the hundreds before truly learning how to play poker.

Today, there are professional training sites you can subscribe to and you can even hire a personal coach. Both of which cost a pretty penny.

But, suddenly, now you can watch pros playing online for absolutely free. Sure, you’re not going to get the sort of personal attention and intensive study that you get with the other methods – but at least it’s free.

How does it work?

First of all, you need an account on Twitch [5]. It’s basically the online platform all poker streamers use for 

their streaming purposes. Think YouTube, but more oriented towards let’s plays and gaming live streams. Don’t worry, signing up is completely free.

Once that’s over, you can just search for poker and start watching. Poker streamers will record themselves live as they’re participating in a poker match, and that feed goes straight to Twitch and to your screen. You watch them in real time as they’re playing. And if you want to watch any of their older streams, you can. They’re all saved as videos in the libraries of the channels you’re watching. A little browsing, and you’ll find whatever you want.

It’s about entertainment too

It’s true that watching poker streaming can be educational and you can learn a lot from it. But that’s more of an obvious by-product of watching more experienced players do their thing. In reality, poker streamers record themselves live because it’s so entertaining to watch their reactions whenever they win big (or lose big, for that matter). It’s like watching a live poker tournament, except without all the tension involved. Instead you get to join other members from the poker community via live chat as you’re all watching the stream together.

So, basically, poker streaming is a thing for two main reasons: 1. you can learn a thing or two, but, mostly, because 2. it’s really fun to watch.