Ultimate Bet Poker

Ultimate Bet is one of my favorite online poker rooms and always has been. Maybe it's because I'm such a big fan of Phil Hellmuth (don't hate me for that, please), and he was 1 of the main pros who were spokespersons for UB poker for years. Some of it has to do with the cool and stylish software though. I always felt like playing poker on UltimateBet.com was really state of the art and futuristic. I particularly enjoyed the miniview version, which makes multitabling at Ultimate Bet a breeze.

UltimateBet.com Promotions

Ultimate Bet Deposit Bonus

Ultimate Bet currently offers a great signup bonus for new players. It's a 100% deposit bonus worth up to $650. (So if you deposit $650, you'll have a total bankroll of $1300 to play with.) Like most other online poker sites, Ultimate Bet does unlock your bonus based on how many raked hands you play. The more you play, the more of your bonus is unlocked.

WSOP Packages

All online poker sites give away packages to the World Series of Poker, and Ultimate Bet is no different. The folks are Harrahs have gotten pretty draconian with their rules about how you can use their trademark though, so these types of promotions aren't as heavily promoted as in years past.

Aruba Classic

Ultimate Bet is the host of an annual poker tournament in Aruba. At the time of this writing, the Aruba tournament is in its 7th year. The prize pool this year is about $2,500,000, and satellite tournaments are available almost all of the time online. (The package to Aruba is worth $8500, so these tourneys are pretty cool.)

The Ultimate Bet Online Championship

Like PokerStars with their World Championship of Online Poker, and Full Tilt with their Full Tilt Online Poker Series, Ultimate Bet also has a big online tourney called the Ultimate Bet Online Championship. This year there was over $2,000,000 guaranteed in the UBOC tourney.

Ultimate Points

All online poker sites offer frequent player points, and Ultimate Bet is no different. You can earn Ultimate Points while you play raked poker games there, and later use those points to buy tournament entries and poker related merchandise in their online store.

Guaranteed Tournaments

Ultimate Bet offers $30,000 bounties every single night. They also host a $200,000 guarantee every Sunday and a weekly $125,000 guarantee every week. They also have frequent freerolls and a tournament leader board.

Ultimate Bet.com Software and Random Number Generator

Is Ultimate Bet Rigged?

UltimateBet.com is actually one of the oldest poker websites online too, having launched in 2000. I've never seen any evidence that their software is rigged or does anything other than deal a fair game. In fact, unlike a lot of poker websites, there don't seem to be many players screaming, "This site is rigged!" when they lose. Maybe that's a perception thing on my part, but I'm confident enough in it that I don't mind saying it here.

Ultimate Bet Poker's RNG

Ultimate Bet goes into great detail on their website to detail how their random number generator actually works in fact. This is in marked contrast to most online poker rooms, who mention that they have a RNG, but who don't really explain it. Of course, reading it makes me realize what a dense subject a detailed explanation of a random number generator is, so I understand why most other poker cardrooms online don't bother with detailed explanations.

Ultimate Bet Poker Games

The room offers a wider variety of poker offerings than most other Internet poker sites. All of the standard casino poker games are included:

• Texas holdem (in no limit, pot limit, and limit formats)
• Omaha (in both versions, Omaha and Omaha 8/b)
• 7 Card Stud (both regular stud and 7 card stud 8/b)
• HORSE, HOSE, and HO are all available too

Ultimate Bet is also 1 of the only sites to offer games like:

• Crazy Pineapple and Crazy Pineapple 8/b
• Triple draw ace to five and Triple draw deuce to seven
• Razz
• Royal holdem (Texas holdem played with a deck where the 2's through 9's have been removed)

They also feature a variety of tournament formats, including frequent multitable tournaments, single table sit and go tourneys, and freerolls.

Their games are available in all stakes, from microlimits of $0.01/$0.02 up to $80/$160 games. (Full Tilt has more high stakes action, and so does PokerStars, but I don't play at that level anyway.)

Other Games on Ultimate Bet - Blackjack and Roshambo

Ultimate Bet Blackjack

UB offers single player blackjack from a 6 deck shoe. Like almost every online casino, they shuffle between every hand, so you can forget aboutcounting cards. Doubling down after splitting is allowed, as is resplitting. Dealers have to hit soft 17, and players have the option to take late surrender. Ultimate Bet blackjack is fun as a single player game, but the house definitely has the advantage.

The blackjack game at Ultimate Bet uses the same wallet as your Ultimate Bet poker wallet, the same random number generator, and the same software environment as their poker tables use.

Tournament blackjack at UltimateBet.com is a whole other ball game. 7 players at a table play against each other to see who has the most chips left after 25 hands. Players are eliminated on hands 8, 16, and 25. Being able to make a secret bet once per tournament adds a bluffing element to the game. Strategy in blackjack tournaments at Ultimate Bet has to do with bet sizing more than anything else.

I think the blackjack tournaments are more fun than the single player blackjack game, and they certainly have the opportunity to be more profitable for the player too.

Ultimate Bet is the only site offering elimination blackjack tournaments online.

Roshambo

Rock scissors paper is a game you might remember from childhood, but did you know that it's a big gambling game? I didn't either, but UltimateBet.com was there to make sure I knew about it. In Europe, rock scissors paper is called Roshambo, and they even hold a world championship in the game, similar to the World Series of Poker. Like poker or elimination style blackjack tournaments, Roshambo isn't played against the house; it's played against other players. On each throw you select rock, scissors or paper.

• Rock beats scissors.
• Scissors beats paper.
• Paper beats rock.

Roshambo is available in both regular games and sit and go tournaments. Winning a match requires that you win a specified number of throws. Ties are replayed and don't count at all. The rake on Roshambo is 10%, same as most sit and go poker tournaments, so it's not enough to win 50% of the time to make a profit. You'll need to win at least 55% of the time just to break even.

Ultimate Bet Deposit and Banking Options

Ultimate Bet does accept USA players, and they encourage players to use Visa to deposit. (I know that many Visa cards will decline any kind of charge from a company coded as "gambling". I haven't tried my Visa at UB though, so I don't know if it will work for you or not.) UltimateBet.com also uses ePassporte as a deposit option, which I have used, and it works great if you're not a super high stakes player.

Other deposit options include cashiers checks or bank drafts. Non US based players can use NETeller, Click2Pay, FirePay, and Moneybookers.