Poker rake is a crucial factor to consider when building your preflop ranges. In this article, we'll explore how rake affects your strategy and provide you with practical examples to improve your game.

Rakeless Scenario

Let's start by looking at a scenario where there is no rake:

[Table: CO's Opening Range | Equity vs Range]
On the left, you have CO's opening range. On the right, you can see how much equity each hand has against CO's opening range. Before I show you which hands Hero should defend, let's figure out how much equity Hero would need to defend if there were no rake.

Pot odds = $6 / $8 (CO's bet) + $9 (our call + the dead blinds)
Pot odds = $6 / $17 = 0.35 -> 35% raw equity needed

The difference is staggering! 50% compared to 35%. Let's take a look at how different Hero's defending range is with and without rake:

[Table: Rakeless Defending Range]
In this example, we'll assume the cutoff raises with all of the optional hands. Let's assume that the button uses the 3-betting range recommended by the Lab for live games:

[Table: Default Button vs Cutoff Range from Upswing Lab]

We'll assume the button 3-bets only the red and orange hands.

Raked Scenario

Now, let's move on to a scenario where there is rake:

[Table: Local Casino $1/$2 | Effective Stacks $200]
Hero raises to $6. BU 3-bets to $18. 2 folds. Hero…?

Here is the Upswing Lab-recommended open-raising range for live games from the cutoff:

[Table: Default Cutoff Raising Range from Upswing Lab]

In this example, we'll assume the cutoff raises with all of the optional hands.

Let's assume that the button uses the 3-betting range recommended by the Lab for live games:

[Table: Default Button vs Cutoff Range from Upswing Lab]

We'll assume the button 3-bets only the red and orange hands.

Calculating Pot Odds

The process is very similar to the one we used in the previous section. We will first calculate Hero's pot odds:

Pot odds = $12 (how much we need to call) / $12 (our call) + $6 (our raise) + $18 (our opponent's 3-bet) + $3 (dead blinds) – $5 (rake)
Pot odds = $12 / $34 = 0.35 = 35% raw equity needed

If there was no rake, the calculation would look like this:

Pot odds = $12 / $18 + $18 + $3
Pot odds = $12 / $39 = 0.30 = 30% raw equity needed

You can see that the equity difference is not as drastic here. This is because the rake is the same amount ($5), but the pot is larger.

Rake-Adjusted Ranges

Let's see how our range should look in each case (again, I cut out the borderline and unplayable hands that likely won’t realize enough equity):

Poker rake has a big impact on how you should play. You need to take it into account and adjust your strategy if you want to crush as much as possible. If you play online, you can repeat the process above to figure out how much rake should impact ranges in your games. Lookup the rake structure of the site you play on and plug in the numbers.

The resulting ranges won’t be as tight as the ones above, but I bet you’ll still be surprised when you see how much rake makes a difference online. If you’re a live player, now you understand how much poker rake should impact your preflop ranges.

Are the rake-adjusted ranges in this article tighter or looser than you expected? Let me know in the comments below. Good luck, grinders!