PokerPlanets: GipsyTeam Tests a Newer Poker Room & Reviews It

We checked out what's going on at PokerPlanets, taking note of every detail. We played cash games, looked for overlays, and examined promotions and the software. Of course, withdrawals and deposits were checked too.

Creating an Account on PokerPlanets

If your account is new, registration in the room is standard: create a username and password, enter your email address and country of residence, then enter the four-digit code from your email address. You can also enter the GTSEO code here to participate in our exclusive promotions.

Important: To link your account, be sure to use an email address different from the one you used to register at PokerStars Sochi.

Identity Verification on PokerPlanets

Verification is a two-step process. The first requires confirming your mobile phone number via SMS, and the second requires providing identification. We recommend using the mobile app to immediately take a photo and upload it to the client. One of four options is available:

By default, your phone's camera saves photos in JPG format. If the file is already on your device, you can download it as PNG or PDF. For a passport, you'll need a photo of the main spread. For proof of address, you'll need two of the options listed below. All files must be no older than three months.

• Bank documents (a card statement with address and full name will do).
• Utility bills.
• State-issued documents.

During our test drive, our account was verified in about three hours; according to other players, verification usually happens faster.

Depositing on PokerPlanets

You can top up your balance only in the client. Currently, you can transfer funds from a card, via the Fast Payment System (SBP), or through Gazprombank, Alfa-Bank, and Sberbank (they offer the most reasonable limits). Payments via Piastrix, LuxonPay, and cryptocurrency are also supported. Your account is automatically topped up in dollars, even for ruble transfers; the exchange rate is displayed in the cash register.

For smaller amounts, we recommend using Sber, Alpha, or GazpromPay. You can top up your balance with this method for amounts starting from $10. Simply enter your first name, last name, and phone number, then scan the QR code or copy the details in the new window.

For reputable deposits, it's more convenient to use cryptocurrency: you can save money and deposit more quickly. During our test drive, when topping up via card or the Fast Payment System (SBP), we were offered the option to send money to a Tajik sole proprietor.

The selection is limited. The deposit form displays a Bitcoin logo, but in reality, only the following cryptocurrencies are accepted:

• USDT via Polygon, TRON (TRC-20), ERC-20, TON
• USDC via Polygon and ERC-20
• LTC
• XRP
• DOGE

The maximum deposit amount is limited to $2,200, but the limit will increase after full account verification. The room charges no transfer fees, and the USDT transaction was processed in less than a minute.

Collecting a Deposit Bonus on PokerPlanets

For new players, PokerPlanets offers a standard bonus—doubling your deposit to $600. To activate, enter the code PLANETS600 before depositing.

Bonus money is delivered to you in increments, with $3 earned for every $12, equivalent to 25% rakeback. If you deposit less than $600, you can claim the bonus within 60 days. There's also a second bonus, valid for 30 days, which is discussed below.

PokerPlanets Software and Ease of Play

The PokerPlanets client resembles Stars's software, but it uses a different engine, from EvenBet. The interface is clear and uncluttered; if you're not a complete online novice, you won't have any trouble navigating it. In the lobby, you can select the game format, discipline, and hide fully loaded and empty tables.

You can identify the table format by its icons. Some tables feature insurance, Rabbit Hunting, double-spinning, and bomb pots.

The room's appearance settings are traditional: you can change the card design (there's a four-color deck), the table background and back, and disable animations, emojis, and throwables.

For a more comfortable experience, you can enable automatic straddles (or always place them), accept Run It Twice, or offer insurance (which works even when betting under).

The only important feature missing from the client is the ability to set up betting buttons as a percentage of the pot (currently, you can only select the number of big blinds), which means you'll have to adjust the slider yourself.

Another disadvantage was noticed in the room thread on our international language forum:

"After each hand, the hole cards on the table are "lifted" from their discarded/hidden state to their face-up position. Why? This draws attention to a table where nothing is happening; nothing at that table requires our attention, and it doesn't provide us with any information."

The software is stable, with no freezes or crashes during the test drive. After exiting the tables, funds are returned to your balance instantly.

Cash Games on PokerPlanets

Officially, the "Cash Games" tab contains Hold'em and two Omaha variants.

In reality, Omaha games rarely pop up. During a week-long test drive, there was no action at all in the classic four-card variant, and the PLO5 tables quickly collapsed. The tables themselves aren't always displayed in the lobby: for example, there was no action at all on Saturday evening, but on Monday morning, two empty PLO5 tables appeared, at 0.01/0.02 and 0.05/0.10. Here's how support commented:

Omaha and PLO5 tables are displayed dynamically in the lobby based on player demand. If there is insufficient activity or no games have been created, these tables may not be displayed temporarily .

The minimum buy-in at all tables is 25 blinds.

The atmosphere in Hold'em is livelier, but only slightly. There are regularly up to five tables of NL2 and three or four tables of NL10, but mid- and high-stakes games are as hard to find as water on Mars on weekdays. On the weekends, there were a couple of short tables of 0.5/1 with bomb pots and 1/2.

If you manage to find a game, it'll likely be a 6-max game with no ante and the Rabbit Hunt and Run It Twice options enabled. Table selection is possible, but it's inconvenient: you can't choose a specific table, and you'll only see your opponents after you've seated yourself. However, in the lobby, the right-hand section displays the nicknames of all players at the selected limit and their stacks.

The lineups are good even by micro-limits standards: at every table there are amateurs with zero PFR and VPIP 50+, many are sitting with incomplete stacks and without automatic rebuys.

Unfortunately, you can't make much money at NL2

Fast Fold Poker on PokerPlanets

Three Teleport fast fold Hold'em tables are open in the lobby: $0.01/$0.02, $0.05/$0.10, and $0.50/$1 in a five-max format. Unfortunately, we weren't able to catch a game during our test drive.

Tournaments on PokerPlanets

MTTs are somewhat better. There's no shortage of format variety, with knockouts, progressive KOs, rebuys with add-ons, and freezeouts starting at $0.11, as well as satellites to live tournaments at Casino Sochi. The main issue is that most tournaments attract a few dozen or, at best, hundreds of entries. Immediately after its launch, the room experienced significant overlays, but now the guarantees have been reduced somewhat.

For comparison, let's look at tournaments with small buy-ins at other rooms. PokerPlanets' $5.5 Super Bounty Mini Main Daily had a prize pool of $897 and attracted less than 180 players. At RedStar, a similar tournament with a €5 buy-in averages five to seven times larger prize pools.

RedStar Lobby

There are very few Omaha tournaments on the schedule. At one point, we counted all the tournaments in the lobby, and out of 700, only 20 were drawing four cards. One of our forum users summarized the pain of Omaha players on the international language version:

"It's sad that the Omaha tournaments haven't started or are even close to starting. With the required 12 players, I rarely see more than one or two in the lobby. So far, this demo launch seems extremely odd and without much promise. I don't really understand how the room will suddenly get that much traffic."

The post was made at the end of May, but by early autumn the situation hadn't changed much—the Omaha tournament lobby was empty, and even turning on the "Completed" filter didn't radically change the picture.

Technically, there are even tournaments in the lobby for $500 and more, but they don’t attract enough registrations.

What games do they play? Bounty tournaments are the most popular, with over ten tournaments starting daily, ranging from $0.55 to $27.50. Once a week, there's the Jupiter Cup for $215 and a local high roller with the same buy-in, 7-max.

You can gain quite a bit of EV from satellites to live tournaments. For example, in August and September, step satellites for the SPF Sochi fall main event were held four times a day. Freerolls were available, and there were plenty of tickets available, so if you had some free time, there was a good chance of making some money.

Spin & Go on PokerPlanets

The tab only features Hold'em with buy-ins from $0.50 to $10. The room's social media accounts announced the addition of $25 spins, but as of the test drive, there was still no limit.

The cheapest tables are set up in a couple of minutes, while the $10 tournament had to wait about ten minutes to start. All spins are played at 3-max tables in turbo format.

When a multiplier of 25x or higher hits, all tournament participants win. Payout breakdown for a $10 spin:

Hand history and Hand Analysis

You can view your played hands in the "My Games" section. It's convenient: you can filter by game, pot size, table, and time, or filter by winning and losing sessions.

In the "Statistics" tab, you can not only view your statistics, but also evaluate the deviation from optimal values ​​- VPIP, PFR, C-Bet, and others.

Using trackers on PokerPlanets is prohibited. If you're used to opening multiple rooms during a session, you'll be in for another pitfall: running software for use on other platforms can result in account suspension. We've decided to refrain from such an experiment, but the room's rules specifically emphasize this.

Rake and Rakeback on PokerPlanets

Cash game rake is 5% for all disciplines. The cap depends on the number of participants:

In Spins, the rake depends on the buy-in. At $0.50, $1, $3, and $5 tables, the rake is 9%, while at $10 SNGs, the commission drops to 8%. The rake in tournaments is 11%.

The loyalty program will immediately evoke a touch of nostalgia in Stars grinders: familiar chests with six "cosmic" levels:

To open a chest, go to the bonus program menu and click "Claim" next to the desired chest. Don't delay: an unopened chest will expire after 28 days. After opening five slots, you can move up a level.

At the start, you can significantly boost your rakeback with first deposit bonuses. There are two of them. The first, with the code PLANETS600 , offers 25% rakeback and clears within 60 days. And when you top up your account with the code Rakeback80 , the second promotion is activated: technically, it promises up to 80% rakeback, but in reality, the return is not quite as generous.

It works like this: there are 10 chests, the first five ("Andromeda") are opened after paying $20 in rake, the second five ("Milky Way") after $60. The rakeback percentage increases with each subsequent chest: the first Andromeda chest will return $5, the last $16. Technically, the last chest will return 80%, but the average rakeback is significantly lower. You have 30 days to clear it.

After the promotion ends, you automatically become a member of the standard third-level loyalty program, Asteroid.

Support on PokerPlanets

There are two methods to contact support:

• Email support@pokerplanets.com: They respond quickly. During the test drive, we sent about a dozen emails to support, and on average, we had to wait 20-30 minutes for a response. For new inquiries, you don't need to write a separate email; simply reply to the previous one. Support is available 24/7.
• Social media: Telegram: You can ask a question in the comments section of this post. Please note that you might have to wait a while for a response. Information about the latest updates and upcoming promotions and series is also posted there. Tournament tickets are sometimes given away.

At the very end of September, P2P transfers were added to the room. They are instant and commission-free, so the exchange section on the PokerPlanets player forum will be relevant.

If you're having any issues on PokerPlanets or other rooms, GipsyTeam is your best resource and solution.

Withdrawals on PokerPlanets

Withdrawals are possible after verifying your identity and address. To withdraw, you must use the same method as your deposit.

Currently, you can withdraw cryptocurrency from certain countries starting at a $50 minimum. There were no issues with cryptocurrency withdrawals; we submitted the request in the morning, and the funds arrived in our wallet that same evening.

Judging by the forum thread, there are some issues with card withdrawals, but nothing critical.

What's Our Final Review of PokerPlanets?

Impressions after the test drive:

• Account creation and verification were excellent: Registration took a couple of minutes, and the documents were approved fairly quickly.
• Payments are fine: They accept domestic cards, the Fast Payment System (SBP), and cryptocurrency starting from $10. The limits vary widely; if you don't use popular banks, you'll have to deposit at least $125. The room doesn't charge withdrawal fees. After the withdrawal, the funds arrived in your crypto wallet the same day. Crypto withdrawals in Russia start from $20, while for other countries, the limit is higher – $50.
• Bonuses and promotions are okay: The first deposit bonuses and wagering requirements are good, but the promotions themselves are few and far between: no leaderboards with large prizes, few unusual tasks or giveaways. Interesting promotions do happen, but they're rare: for example, the finalists of the Sun Cup tournament received 100% rakeback for a whole month.
• The software is excellent: Despite being in beta testing, the client is completely error-free and works reliably.
• Traffic is poor: Tables above NL25 are very rare. There are regularly 3-4 tables at NL2 and 1-2 at NL10. A couple of times there was action at short-handed $1/$2 and $0.5/$1 tables. We didn't encounter any classic Omaha tables, and a couple of times there was action at cheap five-card tables. Tournaments have AFS of ≈90, and guarantees are rarely exceeded. Turbo freerolls with regular knockouts are very popular.

It's too early to make a final decision – PokerPlanets has been operating for less than six months and will likely actively attract players through major promotions. Right now, the room could be of interest either as an additional option for low-stakes MTTs or for those willing to monitor the schedule for major overlays. Regular freerolls offer a chance to qualify for the SPF series, where you can compete for bigger prizes.