If you’re new to Texas Hold ’em you might not have come across the term “play money” before. Simply put, if you are in a “play money” poker game you are playing with fictional money – you may as well be playing with Monopoly money because it won’t earn you a penny.

Many online poker rooms use the .net version of their domain name to promote the “play money” games and the .com version to promote real money games. For example if you go to http://www.partypoker.net you will be able to download their poker software and play freeroll tournaments and play money poker games both Sit N Go and cash game varieties – none of which will cost you any money to play and won’t cost you any money if you lose. Whereas, if you go to http://www.partypoker.com you are going to the real money site. To play here you will need to deposit money into your bankroll and play with the big boys.

My advice regarding play money games is to join them so that you can familiarise yourself with the poker software that the poker room uses. Each poker room such as PokerStars, FullTilt, PartyPoker, etc all use slightly different forms of poker software. The design, and features will roughly be the same, but there will be minor differences that you should familiarise yourself with. It is best to get used to the features when it is not going to cost you money.

Familiarising yourself with the poker software is the only time I would advise joining a play money Texas Hold ’em poker game. If you’ve been involved in a play money game yourself you’ll be aware that the standard of play is laughable. In fact, by practicing in play money poker games you will actually learn so many bad habits that you will likely emerge a worse player than when you entered. If you are ever tempted to practice your game I can’t emphasise enough not to join a play money cash game.

Some of the freeroll tourney’s can be quite good practice once the wheat has been cut from the chaff, but play money cash games are inhabited by some very “special” people. People that I wouldn’t choose to have dealings with even online! It’s possible to play $0.01/$0.02 cash games online so you could play very comfortably with a bankroll of only $4 or $5 therefore negating the need to go with play money games.