Ignition Poker has been deemed legal for operation by its home government of Costa Rica. It can be considered legal for most US players because very few states have laws designed to go after players themselves. One notable exception to that is the state of Washington. Despite its “casino” name, Ignition was created as a poker-first offering, and it remains operating as a skin of sorts on Bodog/Bovada’s software, and it appears to have accepted players from at least a few other countries as well, as evidenced by the current situation in Australia. Bodog88, which shares the same network with Ignition, announced in summer 2019 that it will also offer online poker to the Australian market. Bodog88 is not a regulated site in Australia but does have a license from the Cagayan Economic Zone Authority (CEZA), which holds online gaming sites accountable for protecting their players.

• Is Ignition Poker Safe
• Is Ignition Poker Legal In Australia Fires

Ignition Casino soft-launched their poker product in August 2016. They fully launched in October 2016.

Keywords: Australia, Australian poker players, bitcoin, online poker, Ignition Poker Aussie Poker Players can still enjoy the game online (Image Source)Australians spend more than $18 billion dollars per year on all forms of gambling, making them the highest gamblers per capita in the world, according to a University of Sydney study. Customers in Australia can also play real money poker at Ignition; other jurisdictions are being added on a regular basis as online poker makes its way across the world. Ignition boasts the largest US network in terms of traffic, with a healthy mix of recreational and professional poker players.

No one would blame you if you thought they were a brand-new poker site. But you’d be wrong.

You see, Ignition acquired their poker room from Bovada. Bovada decided they wanted to focus only on sports and casino gaming. Ignition now offers casino and poker.

This is good news because:

• Ignition will continue to accept US customers.
• They already have an existing player base.
• They will continue to focus on recreational players, while discouraging serious or professional players.
• Ignition will continue to use the same top-notch software Bovada did.

Nothing has changed, other than who owns and operates the poker room.

Well, that’s not entirely true. There are some differences in the poker promotions Ignition offers, as well as a few tiny differences on the software side of things.

Which we will cover in our review, by the way.

But if you already have an account with them, there’s no need to rejoin. Your account has been transferred.

And if you’re already familiar with Bovada – for better or for worse – there’s no need to continue with this review, either.

The following review is more or less for people who’ve never heard of Bovada or Ignition before but are in the market to join a new poker site. Those people will find information about Ignition Poker’s banking details, promotions, games, software and support.

Let’s get to it.

Ignition Poker’s Deposit and Cash Out Options

Ignition accepts only three forms of payment – credit or debit cards (Visa or MasterCard), bitcoin and Rapid Transfer (money transfers).

If you choose to fund your account with plastic, be prepared to pay a 5.9% (or higher) fee. It’s sort of disappointing to see a fee on credit/debit cards, though it could be that they’re just trying to cover the processing costs on their end.

(Some of our sources suggest they do waive fees, but they don’t say why, when or for whom.)

There are no fees for using bitcoin. Good news there. And for Rapid Transfer, you’ll pay a flat $12 fee.

As for cash outs, you’ll have 4 options.

You can use bitcoin for cash outs up to $3,000. There’s no fee, but beware that it can take 2-3 days to process your payment.

Your second option is Rapid Transfer. There is a $75 fee for this.

Your third option is a paper check. You can use these for cash outs up to $3,000. These have a $75 fee and can take 2-3 weeks to hit your mailbox.

Your fourth and final option is cashing out to your credit card. However, bear in mind this is (usually) available only to international players. This costs $75, too.

The withdrawal fees are ridiculous. But you could also argue it’s a worthwhile trade if you’re all but guaranteed to be paid from a US-facing, offshore poker room.

Improved Bonus + VIP Program & Other Promotions

Ignition Poker’s first bonus (when they soft-launched in August 2016) sucked. It was something like $100 for poker players and an additional $1,000 for their casino.

Yeah, you read that right. You joined to play poker, but the majority of the bonus is for their online casino.

Meh. No thanks.

But it looks like maybe that didn’t make sense to them, either, or perhaps enough people complained. Because they improved their offer.

Right now, Ignition is offering a $2,000 welcome bonus. It’s split up into two offers. You’ll get $1,000 for the poker room and another $1,000 for the casino.

That’s much, MUCH better.

The casino bonus is given to you automatically. But you need to earn it by wagering the bonus 25x. Between the play through and the 6 months they give you to complete it, this is a very reasonable offer. The only downside is you cannot play most (if not all) blackjack games, craps, baccarat or roulette.

Your poker bonus, on the other hand, isn’t given to you right away. It’s released to you in increments based on the number of poker points you’ve earned.

Here’s how that works:

You’ll have 30 days to clear the entire offer. Which, honestly, isn’t a whole lot of time. Most people probably won’t clear the entire thing. So just do what you can.

That’s it for their core offer. But Ignition also offers a couple smaller evergreen promotions. Here are the details for those.

Bad Beat – If you lose with (a minimum of) aces full of kings, you’ll win 100x the big blind up to $1,000. Both the winning and losing hands need to use both hole cards. At least 3 players need to be dealt in the hand, too.

Royal Flush – Make a royal flush and win 50x the big blind up to $200. You need to use both hole cards to win the money.

Refer-a-Friend – Send real money playing friends to Ignition and they’ll give you 200% of your friends deposit up to $100. You can send however many friends you want.

VIP Program

Ignition Poker offers a simple VIP program. The idea is this:

You earn points for playing poker. Once you’ve built up a stash, you can then convert 200 poker points into $1 worth of tournament tickets. It’s estimated this comes out to about 1.5% rake back.

You can convert up to 5 million points per month.

Ignition Poker’s Games

Ignition spreads a small selection of poker games. That includes fixed, pot and no limit Texas Holdem, Omaha and Omaha high/low.

Their cash games start out at $0.02/$0.05. The highest stakes depend on the game and variation you’re playing, but the highest offered is $300/$600. The types of cash games you can play include heads-up, 6-max and full ring (9-handed).

But that’s not all. Ignition also offers a fast-fold poker variation. Their version is called Zone Poker.

The general idea behind fast-fold poker is this – you join a pool of other players to play a specific poker game and stake/level. Once you buy in, you’re seated with other players and are dealt a fresh hand.

At this point you can either wait for your turn -OR- you can fold in advance (before the action gets to you). When you fold in advance, you’ll be seated at a new table with different players from the pool and a brand-new hand to play.

This is a fast-paced variation, which is made faster given you’ll only have 15 seconds to act. Playing this variation you should have no problems getting 200-300 hands in per hour.

The stakes for Zone Poker run from $0.02/$0.05 to $0.50/$1.

Tournaments

Ignition offers lot of tournaments, too. In fact, they guarantee $2 million in prize pool money every week. They have tournaments running at all times throughout the day.

Here’s a tiny glimpse into the tournaments Ignition hosts throughout the week:

Event Buy-In

• Mad Monday Event #1 – $15,000 GTD $20 + $2
• Mad Monday Event #2 – $10,000 GTD $75 + $7
• Mad Monday Event #3 – $11,000 GTD $10 + $1
• Mad Monday Event #4 – $12,000 GTD $50 + $5
• Mad Monday Event #5 – $40,000 GTD $100 + $9

This is from their Mad Monday series. The following tourneys are from their “Nightly Majors” series:

Tournament Name Guaranteed Prize Pool Buy-in Starting Chips

• $25,000 Guaranteed $25,000 $55 5,000
• $8,000 Guaranteed $8,000 $11 2,500
• $12,000 Guaranteed $12,000 $109 2,500
• $10,000 Guaranteed $10,000 $22 5,000
• $15,000 Guaranteed $15,000 $55 10,000
• $10,000 Guaranteed $10,000 $109 5,000
• $10,000 Guaranteed $10,000 $11 10,000
• $5,000 Guaranteed $5,000 $33 5,000

And that’s just the beginning.

Buy-ins start as low as $1.10 and will set you back as much as $162. But most of their tournaments do have satellites, which includes their biggest tournament, the $162 $100k guarantee they run on Sundays.

They run SNG tournaments too, though the last couple times I’ve reviewed them they didn’t have many games running. The SNG variations they offer include:

• Deep Stack: Get double the starting chips.
• Satellite: Win your way into one of our bigger tournaments.
• Turbo: Turn up the speed with faster blind levels.
• Double Up: Survive half the field and double your buy-in.
• Triple Up: Place in the top third to triple your buy-in.
• Hyper Turbo: Our fastest format – play for fun, high-speed action.

Buy-ins here range from $1.10 to $215. Table sizes range from heads up (2 players) to 45 players.

Overall, they have a small, yet solid selection of poker cash, SNG and MTT games and variations.

They have plenty of traffic, too, only trailing the likes of PokerStars and 888. But the difference between Ignition Poker and these poker sites is Ignition’s player base is mostly recreational aka soft.

You can clean up real good here if you have a solid poker foundation.

Ignition’s Software Features

There are several features that stand out to us.

Is Ignition Poker Safe

The most talked about – and the most polarizing – are their anonymous tables. Screen names aren’t used. Numbers are used to identify players instead.

In addition to that, you’re not able to take permanent notes, tag your opponents or use 3^rd party tracking software.

These rules are in place to promote and encourage loose, fun, recreational games. Pros are more or less discouraged from playing here.

However, one thing that is unique about Ignition – and sort of counter to their recreational player approach – is they let you play as many as 20 tables at once. Bovada allowed only 15 before the sale, and 6-12 months before that the max was 4 tables.

(So, pros can still get volume here if they pass under the radar.)

Some of their other software features include:

• Selecting your own card and table design
• Playing in different languages including English, Spanish and Chinese
• Adding card animation. This means you can add special effects like lightening bolts or flames to your cards. These go off whenever you win a hand.
• Rabbit Cam. See what the next card would’ve been when you fold on the flop or turn.
• Show pot total
• Show bet value
• Show hand strength
• Show folded hand
• Four colored decks
• This light follows the action around the table. It makes it easier to know who’s turn it is.

Further, tables can be set up in full screen mode, cascading tiles or in a 4×4 resizable grid.

Overall, their software is some of the best available to American players. And it’s on par with the rest of the world, only maybe trailing the likes of PokerStars, Full Tilt, 888, Bet365, etc.

Is Ignition Poker Legal In Australia Fires

Their software is available for download for both Mac and Windows.

It’s mobile compatible, too, with Android and iOS. No download required. This is one of the only (if not the only) mobile poker options Americans have. Here you’ll be able to play cash and Zone Poker games.

We hope to see tournaments added in the near future.

How to Reach Out for Support

There are multiple ways to get in touch with support. You can call them toll-free at 1-888-263-0000. Another option is to reach out by email or contact them by live chat on their website.

Conclusion

Ignition Poker is an excellent poker site. Definitely a top-notch option for US poker players. Here are some of the reasons to check them out:

• Loose, soft games full of inexperienced (recreational) players.
• No tracking, tagging or note-taking allowed.
• Mobile-compatible games for Android and iOS players.
• A $2,000 bonus split evenly between their poker room and casino.
• They’re licensed and regulated and come from a brand people already know, like and trust.
• They’re 3^rd in overall traffic, which means you won’t have to wait for a poker game to fire.

The bottom line is they’re one of the best options for Americans. They have a positive reputation thus far, both for taking care of their players …and for paying them.

What more can you ask for? Create your Ignition Poker account now – if you haven’t already.

This review was made by: LegitGamblingSites.com Rating: 4.1 out of 5

Pokerstars is one of the most popular online poker rooms in the world and attracts more players every day. All you have to do is create an account and join a table. Australian gambling laws, however, change the ways in which you can play on Pokerstars.

Learn how to sign up for Pokerstars Australia, here. Find out if you can still play with your old account and how to redeem your rewards.

Your Invitation to the Best Online Pokies in Australia

Like a punt on the slot machines?

Our top rated slots for October 2019 are the smash-hit online pokie sites: Ruby Fortune and Jackpot City Casino.

These sites include some impressive matched bonuses – up to $750 and $1600 respectively! With the potential for some seriously big wins, here’s your chance to get a piece of the action:

Can You Still Play on Pokerstars Australia?

The short answer is yes and no. Yes, you can still play poker on Pokerstars if you live in Australia. You cannot, however, make deposits into your Pokerstars account or play real money games.

In 2016, the Interactive Gambling Amendment Bill came before the Australian Parliament. The bill bans all gambling website that is not licenced under state or federal law. Pokerstars is an off-shore company that offers poker services remotely via the internet.

So, when the bill was passed by Parliament on August 16, 2017, Pokerstars could no longer provide Australians access to real money poker games. Even today, you can only play free-to-play games on Pokerstars if you are an Aussie.

The same goes for Full Tilt Poker, which became subject to the same laws in August 2017. Full Tilt Poker is part and parcel of Pokerstars.

What Happens to Your Pokerstars Account?

Not to worry–your Pokerstar account funds are safe and retrievable. The company operation funds are separate from players account funds. The cashier on Pokerstars still functions to withdraw any remaining balance from your Pokerstars account into your linked bank account.

You can log into Pokerstars with your old account information to retrieve leftover funds and rewards. Be aware, that you cannot play on real money tables or enter into real money tournaments. If your account is registered in Australia, you can only access your information and withdraw funds.

Or, you can play for free with fake money. But, you cannot use your real money funds to play poker on Pokerstars in Australia.

Any tournament money or tickets that are left in your Pokerstars account are automatically converted into cash when you go to the cashier. The cashier converts tournament tickets and money into the equivalent value in real money.

If you happened to be online and playing on Pokerstars when the law went into effect in 2016, what happened to the money on the table, that you were playing with? It was refunded to you. Any buy-in amount that was active at the time of disconnection has been put back into your account.

What About Your StarsRewards?

StarsRewards and StarsCoin can still be spent on merchandise in the Pokerstars store. But, it isn’t as much fun to sport the colours when you can’t actually play on the site. So, you can also purchase a $1 cash rebate from the Pokerstars store to convert your StarsCoins into real money.

Chests that are not open yet can still be opened and the rewards claimed. You should, however, claim any rewards that are pending before you cash out. If you have any chests yet to be opened, do it before going to the cashier.

For converting your T-money into real cash, contact Pokerstars support and they will help you.

Is Full Tilt Poker and Pokerstars Owned by the Same Company?

Both, Pokerstars and Full Tilt Poker are operated and owned within the United States. Pokerstars bought Full Tilt Poker as part of a settlement with the United States Government in 2012.

About a year earlier, on April 15th, 2011, the United States Government shut down domain access to Pokerstars, Full Tilt Poker, and Absolute Poker for a slew of offences.

That day was the last for Absolute Poker, and it was never heard from again. Pokerstars and Full Tilt Poker regained access and use of their domain names before settlement talks began. The acquisition opportunity for Pokerstars took shape once regulators began looking into the two companies financial status.

Pokerstars acquired Full Tilt Poker due to Full Tilt’s poorly run finances. Pokerstars entered into settlement talks with government entities in quick order after the shutdown. The company was in good financial shape and made quick work of paying US customers their due settlement.

Full Tilt Poker, however, was not able to pay back their customers. The company was in bad shape financially, and regulators shut down the site after it was clear that Full Tilt was bankrupt. Pokerstars used the opportunity to the companies advantage.

The United States government and Pokerstars agreed that Pokerstars would acquire all of Full Tilt Pokers’ assets and intellectual property–as well as their settlement debt.

In total, the government garnished $547 million from Full Tilt and Pokerstars to pay back customers in the United States, and in 2014 the payments started to roll out.

How to Sign Up on Pokerstars for Play Money in Australia

No worries, if you still want to play on the old interface. Pokerstars is still a great platform for online poker, even if you can’t play for real money. If you just want to play for free, here is how to sign up on Pokerstars Australia:

1. Download Pokerstars

From the Pokerstars website homepage, click on the icon that reads, “Play Poker.” You are directed to a download page where you click on the “Download” icon. A download notification should pop up on your screen to ask you to run the program.

Click “Run Program” and the installation process begins. Choose which language you prefer and read the Pokerstars Terms and Conditions before pressing the “Next” button at the bottom of the window. Click “Install” and “Finish” once the install is complete.

2. Creating a Pokerstars Account

Now you have the software on your computer, so it’s time to create your Pokerstars Australia account. From the main lobby screen, click the “Create Account” button under the “Account” drop-down menu. Choose a username/password that you can remember and verify your email.

Once you have created your account and verified your email, it’s time to play poker! And, Pokerstars even offers mobile account setup for poker on-the-go.

3. Choose Your Game

Choose from the free-to-play game selection in the Pokerstars lobby. You can play limit or no-limit Hold’em, Stud, and Omaha poker. Click on your game of choice and choose an open seat to sit down in.

Be aware, if you try to make a real money deposit in your new PokerStars account you will be denied. You cannot deposit funds within an Australian IP address. And, don’t even try working around it with a VPN.

The Australian government has provisions in place to keep you from using a VPN to deposit, and so does Pokerstars. If you want to play poker for real money in Australia, Pokerstars is the wrong place.

Where Can You Play Online Poker for Real Money in Australia?

So, where can Aussies play online poker for real money? Plenty of places!

The law doesn’t restrict playing online poker at all. It only restricts non-Australian poker sites from operating within the country. Forget Pokerstars–there is a new popular poker room for Aussies to play a few hands.

Ignition Poker and Casino

Ignition Poker came onto the Australian scene shortly after the new law went into effect. By 2017, Ignition Poker claimed a stake in the Australian online poker industry. The site is owned by Bodog Group, making the site and services as reputable as they come.

Bodog Group is a collection of online poker rooms and online casinos that operate all over the world. It is owned by the PaiWangLuo Network–the largest parent company of online gambling websites in the world.

Ignition Poker started in the United States in 2016, before making services available to Australians as well a year later. So, you can sit at tables with Australians and Americans.

Ignition Poker offers all the same games as Pokerstars, as well as some new and unique poker games. Players accrue club rewards and receive promotions for Ignition Casino. It offers a regular tournament schedule with high guarantees, as well as cash and sit-n-go tables.

Unlike Pokerstars or Full Tilt Poker, Ignition Poker offers a cryptocurrency deposit method for Bitcoin users. Minimum Bitcoin deposits are $10 and a maximum of $5,000.

Players can also deposit via a credit or debit card to play at the same tables as Bitcoin users. $20 is the minimum deposit for cards and $1,500 is the maximum deposit.

The big benefit of depositing with cryptocurrency is that it doesn’t incur any fees. Bitcoin has no withdrawal or deposit fees on Ignition Poker. Card deposits are charged a 5.9% fee, except for American Express cards. Amex cards are charged a 9.9% deposit fee.

Final Thoughts

Pokerstars Australia is still up and running for free-to-play users. But, if you’re looking for the real thing in Australia, check out Ignition Poker, Bodog88, or BlackChip Poker.

They are just a few of the reputable online poker rooms that have sprung up since Pokerstars discontinued service in Australia.

If you like this article on signing up for Pokerstars Australia, share it with your social media community. And check out the blog for more information on Australian online poker. Thanks for reading!