Fast payouts (often in 3 hours)
$5,000 cash Freeroll
Email response less than 10min

Ultimate Bet Poker Review

UltimateBet is one of the world's leading poker rooms and an innovator with many new features in its software combined with a nice and sleek look and feel. The game variation is very good and there are many super high limit games.

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Total weighted score
Software + Graphics .
Ring Game Traffic .
Tournament Traffic .
Game Variety .
Rake .
Soft Competition .
Sign-Up Bonus .
Loyalty Bonus .
Promotions .
Support .
Financial Security .
Deposit+withdrawl.systems

High limit games

High profile endorsers

Fast payouts (often in 3 hours)

Ultimate Poker Classic in Aruba

The MiniView feature (great for multiple table play)

Choose your own background environment

Sponsors of the WPT Ultimate Classic in Aruba

$5,000 cash Freeroll

High profile endorsers

Fast payouts (often in 3 hours)

Mini View feature

$18,000 WPT Freroll

No live or telephone support

Not great sit and go tournament volume

Sign-up bonus in $
Deposit bonus in % .
Referral bonus per friend .

$650
.100%
.$0

UltimateBet is one of the world's leading poker rooms and an innovator with many new features in its software combined with a nice and sleek look and feel. It is part of the Excapsa network, one of the largest online poker networks, which include sites such as UltimatePoker.com. The traffic at UltimateBet is among the top 3-4 in both ring games and tournaments. The game variation is very good and there are many super high limit games. BlackJack is also offered now. There are decent promotions and a great frequent player program. Several poker pro endorsers participate in the games. UltimateBet has few weaknesses and is by many regarded as the new leader in terms of overall experience. Real money player statistics - Oct, 2006: 2,800-3,150 ring game players at peak hours, 12,000-15,000 tournament players at peak hours.

UltimateBet's graphics have a unique and sleek look. It runs quickly and reliably. The MiniView feature is really great, which perfectly suits players who play at many tables at the same time (the user can always switch each table back to standard view). Notes on players are supported. The statistics function is advanced with great detail in the information (only your own game is being monitored here). There is a "buddy program" where a player can keep track on when and where friends and favorite players are at the site. The player can choose among 8 different background environments. A Windows emulator is needed for Mac and Linux users to make the UltimateBet software compatible. Overall, UltimateBet has top-notch software! The software now has 2 innovative features the ability to fold and show as well as a bet pot button at pot limit tables.

UltimateBet is typically in top 4 to 5, in terms of ring games traffic. The number of real money players in ring games is typically reaching 2,800-3,150 at peak hours (Oct, 2006). The traffic is quite well spread out over all types of games (compared to many other rooms where traffic is concentrated to Holdem only).

UltimateBet's traffic at the tournaments is very good at peak hours, where the traffic will reach somewhere between 12,000-15,000 (Oct, 2006). But the traffic is down earlier in the evenings (European peak hours). At multi-table tournaments, there is sometimes a "player bounty", in which the participant who eliminated the bounty player gets a special price!

UltimateBet has a good game selection, with Holdem, Omaha Hi and Hi-Lo, 7-Card-Stud Hi and Hi-Lo, Pineapple and Triple Draw 7-2. There are no-limit and pot-limit in Holdem and pot-limit in both Omaha variants. There are 1-on-1 tables in both Holdem, Omaha and 7-Card-Stud. The site was also first to introduce Pineapple (a variation of Holdem where you get three hole cards and have to discard one card after the flop). There are also certain "kill games" in which a consecutive winner of two big qualifying pots has to post a forced blind, twice the big blind. Now BlackJack is also offered.

UltimateBet's rake is somewhat less attractive than the average in the industry, at least when it comes to lower limit games. The rake caps at UltimateBet are in line with the industry, but the drop is taken at more frequent intervals, which result in a higher effective rake. However, the maximum rake for short-handed games, are capped at lower than at many other rooms. Moreover, in the heads-up and three-player tables there is a very low cap. The tournaments have a flat buy-in charge of 10% for all levels except for the $1 events, which are free and the $100 where the charge is 9%. In heads up tournaments there is a 5% charge.

The full tables at $0.5/$1 limits and up have view flop percentages in the mid 30-ies up to mid 40-ies in most cases, which is tight but not too bad. There are certainly easier sites to win money at, but among the top 5 online poker rooms UltimateBet scores average.

100% - up to $650 - in bonus dollars. Bonus Dollars will be converted to real money for play on the site at the rate of $1 for every 10 UltimatePoints™ you earn at our Raked Ring Game tables.
Bonus Dollars will be converted to real money for play on the site at the rate of $1 for every 30 UltimatePoints™ you earn at our Sit 'n Gos and Tournaments.

UltimatePoints are awarded for each raked hand or tournament as well as 1 point per hour and table during play. Extra points are awarded players who start up new games. Points can be used for entries to tournaments or merchandise purchases.

The response time for most emails are under 10 minutes. Except for some service lag since the software upgrade. However, PokerListings members just contact us at info@pokerlistings.com and any issues will be handled promptly. The staff is nice and knowledgable overall. However, they still only have email support.

24/7 support: Yes
Website FAQ: No
Support Features: Email
Email confirmation/receipt: No
Speed: Very fast
Knowledge: Ok
Friendliness: 85%
Avg. NETeller pay out time: 24-48 hrs
Withdrawal smoothness: 80%

PokerStars has good promotions for the regular player and gives quite a lot back in the form of promotions as well as loyalty bonuses (see above). There are frequent re-deposit bonuses where you typically get 20-25% bonus match of deposits up to $600 for $100-$120 bonus. There are a lot of special event tournaments, which can be found at the home page. Typically, they offer satellites for most major land based tournaments, such as the World Poker Tour, Professional Poker Tour and World Series of Poker. There are tons of freerolls but they are of pretty low value in general because they are only satellites to weekly freeroll finals.

Deposit options:
VISA (Delta, Electron, Gift and Prepaid), MasterCard (Gift and Prepaid), NETeller (minimum deposit only $25 and free instaCASH for US and Canadian players), FirePay, eChecks, CentralCoin, Diners Club International, Solo/Maestro/Switch (available to UK players only), Cashier's Check/Money Order/Bank Draft (min deposit $100).

Cash out options:
NETeller, FirePay, CentralCoin and eCheck. Avg. NETeller pay out time: 8 hrs