Poker Shark
How much bankroll do you need for $1/$3 live poker?
A solid live winner (8bb/100) needs about $4,200 (14 buy-ins of $300) for $1/$3 with less than 5% risk of ruin over roughly two years of weekly play. A modest winner (4bb/100) needs about $6,300.
Solid winner (8 bb/100)
14 buy-ins of $300
Modest winner (4 bb/100)
21 buy-ins of $300
For less than 5% risk of ruin over 30,000 hands (about two years of weekly play) at 90 bb/100 standard deviation. Numbers come from the same Monte Carlo engine as the calculator.
$1/$3 has quietly replaced $1/$2 as the entry game in a lot of American card rooms, and the bankroll math scales with it: the standard buy-in moves from $200 to $300, so every requirement is half again bigger than the 1/2 number even though the game plays almost identically. If a room offers both, the 1/2 game is the cheaper classroom for the same lessons.
The player pool at 1/3 is nearly the same crowd as 1/2, which is good news: your win rate should survive the move intact. What changes is the size of the swings in dollars. A modest winner's 95th percentile downswing at 1/3 runs about $7,560, so the cushion that felt generous at 1/2 is merely adequate here.
A useful way to plan the 1/2 to 1/3 move: treat your bankroll as buy-ins rather than dollars. The simulator's threshold is 14 buy-ins for a solid winner in both games; when your roll covers that many $300 bullets instead of $200 ones, you have made the move without changing anything about how you play.
Opens the calculator preloaded for $1/$3 live. Adjust your bankroll and win rate for a personal verdict.
Frequently Asked Questions
How much should I buy in for at $1/$3?
The standard 100 big blind buy-in is $300, and many 1/3 games allow $500 caps. Match the table: in a game full of deep stacks, a full buy-in keeps your big hands from going to waste; short-stacking to save money usually costs more in lost value than it protects.
Is $1/$3 harder than $1/$2?
Barely. It draws the same recreational crowd in most rooms, and the skill jump is far smaller than the 50% jump in money. That combination, same opponents at bigger stakes, is exactly why the bankroll requirement deserves respect: the variance grows even when the difficulty does not.
How many buy-ins do I need for 1/3?
Our simulations say 14 buy-ins ($4,200) for a solid 8bb/100 winner and 21 buy-ins ($6,300) for a modest 4bb/100 winner. The classic 20 to 30 buy-in guideline maps to the modest column, so use it if your win rate is unproven.
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