Best Poker Sites for Sit N Go Tournaments

Sit and Go tournaments are the bread and butter for many online players. With multiple formats to choose from including heads-up, step tournaments, double or nothing and shorthanded, players will never fall short of finding a tournament. All poker sites offer sit and go tournaments, although only a handful really have the volume of players to keep the games running. There is nothing worse than going through the hassle of signing up and depositing only to conclude that the poker room has zero sit and go traffic.

Below we have compiled a list of the best sit and go poker sites. These sites offer a solid range of games, stakes and variations to keep any sit'n'go player happy. Regardless of which sit and go poker site you choose to play at, we guarantee you that there is an adequate supply of players. In fact, we have never waited more than 4 minutes for a game. Stakes vary from $1 and can increase up to a few thousand depending on the site.

Types of Sit and Go Tournaments

Regular Sit and Go
The standard sit and go tournament is a single table tournament where each player receives the same number of chips to start. Players do not have the option to re-buy in a sit and go, therefore, once a player is out, their game ends there. The sit and go will start once registration is full and blinds will increase based on the number of hands dealt. Some sit and go poker sites will increase the blinds with regular timed intervals, usually every five or ten minutes. The blinds will continue to increase until there is only one player left at the table. Sit and go tournaments normally pay out only the top 2 players (in a 6-max game) or the top three (when playing 9 person).

Step Tournaments
Step tournaments were recently introduced a few years ago. This type of sit and go tournament offers a multi-tiered system with a range of buy-ins. In step tournaments, the first prize is often a seat into the next level, and any remaining prizes are often tournament tokens into another step tournament equal to the event played. As a player climbs the steps, the value of the tournament increases, up to the final step where cash is paid out or a seat into a large event, such as the WSOP. Not all sit and go poker sites offer step tournaments. To our knowledge, these tournaments are only available at Party Poker, 888 Poker, Pokerstars and Full Tilt.

Double or Nothing Sit and Go
Double or Nothing sit and go tournaments was first introduced at Pokerstars. These tournaments offered a different payout structure than other sit and go's. A double or nothing tournament will pay out the top 3 players in a six person tournament. The prize pool is divided equally among the three.

Sit and Go Poker Strategy

Sit and go poker is the most systematic form of the game. As a result of the predictability in sit and go poker, winning players tend to adhere to a computer-like approach to the game. There are situations that will always be slightly different from the next, but for the most part, sit and gos are played the same way each and every time. Instead of analyzing individual situations, players look for the best option between raising, folding, and going all in. There are times where calling can be optimal as well, but these opportunities are diminished as play progresses. Once stack sizes start to get smaller in relation to the blinds, players look for chances to go all in. If they don’t have a good enough hand to go all in, they just throw their hand away. This is widely known as push fold poker. If you want to become a winning sit and go player, particularly in games above the micro stakes, you will need to learn how to implement the proper push fold strategy.

Micro Stakes Sit and Go Strategy

Micro stakes games tend to be the exception to every piece of poker advice. Where in mid stakes and higher stakes sit and gos it is a necessity to play push fold poker, in the micro stakes it is not. Since the majority of the players in these limits really don’t know what they are doing anyway, there is little need to play according to a defined system. The benefit of playing push fold poker is that you alleviate yourself of the need to make any tough decisions, largely due to the fact that you are facing stiffer competition. In the micro stakes, however, the competition is so weak that players can easily be read like an open book. If you transition from success in mid stakes cash games or tournaments, it is highly unlikely that you are going to struggle in the micro stakes sit and gos, regardless of prior experience.

Mid Stakes Sit and Go Strategy

Once you move out of the micro stakes games and into the mid stakes games, you will be forced to learn how to put pressure on your opponents. More importantly, you also need to learn how to rid yourself of unnecessarily difficult spots. For example, a lot of players will get in hands where they can theoretically call an open raise, re raise, or re raise all in. Of these three options, only going all in will generally yield positive results. This is the difference between sit and go strategy and cash game or even tournament strategy. The reason that players need to put all of their chips on the line at once is derived from the fact that stack sizes are very small in relation to the total chips in play. 10,000 chips is nothing if the blinds are 1,000/2,000. The number one key to success in mid stakes or higher sit and gos is the ability to determine when you should go all in and when you should fold. When it comes down to it, these often end up being your only legitimate options.