What is rake? Rake is what the casino makes as a profit from every hand played at poker. In brick and mortar casinos, there are laws on how much rake the casino can take. For example, you’re sitting at a $5/$10 limit Hold’em table. The casino has a 5% rake fee per hand up to a maximum of $5 for this table. So any pot of $100.00 or more, the casino will drop a $5 chip into the rake bucket. If the pot was $40.00, they would take $2.00. Doesn’t seem like a lot at first, after all they have the dealers, the pit bosses, the table, chairs, cards, chips, etc to pay for.

I was a poker pit boss for several years and I did the drops (collected the rake). On a standard $5/$10 table that was full, should make around $75-$100 per hour (depending on speed of game and dealer). So in my average 12 hour shift, I would drop around $1000.00 for that one table. Multiply the numbers of tables and different limits, and you have what I would refer to as a gold mine. Poker rooms don’t want you thinking about this.

5% is an acceptable rate. I have seen 10% on a cruise ship, which is robbery but hey, I was at sea for 9 days. The ship is raking in so much of the money on the table that if there are no players waiting to play, the rake will slowly dwindle everyone’s stacks. 10% will kill a game.

Watch the dealers and see if they are raking heavy or light. Heavy is when the dealer is taking $3 on a $55 pot with a 5% rake. A good dealer will rake light and if the players are watching, tip accordingly. I will call the pit boss if I see a dealer raking more than they should. It makes the other players aware and the dealer will probably rake light after.

Poker is a no brainer for a casino, it cannot lose money. However, square foot for square foot, poker does not bring in as much as other house games. So from now on, pay some attention to the rake and maybe you will find the dealer is raking heavy. If so, tell them I sent you, you are now part of the rake police.