PokerStars has been around since the early 2000s. It was established by Rational Intellectual Holdings Limited in the year 2001. It was initially created as a betting site for poker players, but later expanded into casino and sports betting in 2016. Pokerstars covers over 30 sports from international and local leagues. It contains top international sports like football, basketball, and boxing, and also Irish-specific sports like Gaelic football and hurling.
The PokerStars app is intuitive and contains as many games as the website, with multiple reliable payment methods. PokerStars has put in more effort to make sure its app stands out with top features. In this review, you’ll be learning about our experience testing the Pokerstars app, its features, bonuses, usability, and all other necessary information.
Rational Intellectual Holdings Limited operates PokerStars, and they hold a remote bookmaker licence from the Revenue Commissioners. PokerStars is a safe and law-abiding bookmaker. If you’re in doubt, you can verify their licence by visiting the Irish Revenue Commissioners’ public register.
We’ve checked through all of the promotions available on Pokerstars and found just a few. There’s a welcome bonus that is exclusively for poker players, and 1 other offer that sports lovers can take advantage of. The poker welcome bonus comes with a code. Now, let’s look at the specifics of these bonuses
PokerStars does not currently provide players with a no-deposit bonus. You can keep an eye on the promotion page to get updates on those kinds of offers.
As of the time of the review, there are only two ongoing offers for sports players. It is called the Star Sub bonus, and this is how it works. The bookmaker lets you place player-based bets that remain active even if your selected player is substituted. In such cases, the substitute’s performance counts toward your bet. This offer applies to major European leagues and UEFA competitions, and it covers markets like goals, assists, bookings, shots, and fouls. The offer only applies to the full 90-minute match bets; it does not apply to extra time and penalties.
The other offer is boosted odds on specific bets. Pokerstars increases the odds on specific matches, mainly pre-match bets. If you’re considering betting on football matches, the matches with boosted odds will give you more value; bet on those.
There’s currently no seasonal offer on the PokerStars promotion page.
PokerStars does not have any bonuses that are exclusively for its mobile apps. The bonuses found on the mobile site are the same you’ll find on the mobile apps.
We found a loyalty program on Pokerstars, but it only benefits poker players. The Loyalty programs reward poker players with points and bonuses as they play and deposit. The loyalty program is a tiered incentives program that unlocks better rewards, gives access to special promotions, better customer support, and priority services.
The reward points earned from the program can be redeemed. Pokerstars’ focus is heavily on the poker section of the bookmaker; maybe that’s why they’ve limited the offer to poker players. For sports lovers, we have no share in the loyalty program.
The loyalty program requires more attention to details, take out time to read through and understand every requirement to obtain the offers. We may not be able to state every detail here, but all can be found on the promotion page of the Pokerstars site and app.
Getting fully registered on PokerStars will only take you about 5 minutes. Here is the step-by-step process to get registered:
Here are some of the markets covered:
The sports covered by Pokerstars may not be as many as those covered by competitors, but the good part is that most of the Irish favourites are covered.
To help you maximize betting opportunities, we checked for available tools and found some helpful ones. These tools include:
This is not the first time we’re checking out Pokerstars sportsbook, but this time we’ve seen an upgrade. Pokerstars didn’t use to have a live streaming option, but has recently been upgraded to offer a live streaming service for up to 10 sports, including football. We tested the live streaming across multiple sports and can confidently say that it’s of standard and high resolution. You’ll enjoy streaming your favourite football matches on the sportsbook.
There’s also the live betting option, where you can bet on live matches. We also tested the live betting section of the sportsbook and found it to be filled with advanced in-play betting options. The combination of live streaming and betting on Pokerstars is a game-changer. More advanced bettors like us can not confidently place in-play bets while watching live matches. We recommend you try out the live betting and streaming on the mobile app.
In our review, we checked the odds offered by PokerStars for both Premier League football and NBA basketball. Football matches had an average margin of 5.7%, which is good and lower than what you’ll find on many bookmakers’ sites. while basketball matches showed a higher margin of up to 7%, meaning it’s slightly less favourable for bettors like yourself. Overall, football odds are good, but the basketball odds are not competitive.
We checked through the list of acceptable payment methods and found options like debit cards, e-wallets, bank transfer, and prepaid cards available. All of the deposits are processed instantly, while withdrawal time varies by method. The minimum amount you can deposit is €1,0 while withdrawals vary by method. You can withdraw up to €6,500 using the Visa payment method. Pokerstars usually processes withdrawals within 24 hours of submission, and you can expect to receive payment after processed.
PokerStars does not support payment via cryptocurrency, and transactions in Ireland are made in euros (EUR).
Pokerstars has a dedicated mobile app that is available for download on the Google Play Store and the App Store. The iOS app is rated 4.5 stars out of 5, while the Android version is rated 4.0. From our test, we had several issues with the mobile site’s loading time, even with a stable network.
The pages take time to load, and that can really be frustrating. It’s clear that the apps work better, load faster, and have more features than the website version. There’s really nothing you desire on the website that is not available on the mobile app. We recommend the app anytime.
If you have any enquiries or complaints, we recommend using the live chat customer support. We have tested the chat support and gotten positive feedback. You’ll get connected to a customer agent within 3 minutes, and they’ll be available to attend to you. We observed that, even with the customer agent attending to you, you still cannot get some information without logging in to your account.
So sign in before contacting customer support. Pokerstars has social media accounts that attend to players online; if you prefer, that means it’s still fine. Customer service is available in English, French, German, and Russian.
From what we’ve seen, PokerStars is genuinely committed to promoting safe and responsible play. The Responsible Gaming section is easily accessible through both the website and mobile app. Here are the tools we found on Pokerstars’ responsible gambling page:
There are times when gambling feels overwhelming, and you just know you’re not in control again. If you ever get to that point, then it’s time to take advantage of the organization’s support available to deal with gambling issues.
PokerStars has collaborated with support organisations like GamCare, Gambling Therapy, and Gamble Aware to help you get professional help if you ever need it. If you feel that gambling is starting to affect your daily life, visit the Responsible Gaming section for practical tools, guidance, and support.
In order to understand other users’ experience with Pokerstars, we went through hundreds of reviews on Trustpilot and other reputable review sites, and the feedback shows a mix of some positives and large areas for improvement.
While some players have commended the just-included live streaming and the focus on Irish-specific sports, on the downside, many have complained about their accounts being restricted and even closed down for reasons unknown. Pokerstars is very strict on security, and the smallest trace of insecurity will result in closing your account.
A few users have also expressed their dissatisfaction with the customer support response. Users whose accounts have been restricted have complained about the time it takes to lift the ban on the accounts. Despite these drawbacks, the customer support has had testimonies of opening back accounts that were restricted, even if it takes a bit more than expected. A customer phone contact would have been great, because some of the players prefer to speak directly with a person over the phone.
Some of the main software providers powering PokerStars Casino include:
If you enjoy playing live casino games, then this is for you. PokerStars’ live casino games are packed with live roulette, blackjack, poker, game shows, and baccarat & Sic Bo. The live casino games are provided by Pragmatic Play, On Air Entertainment, and Evolution. The quality of Pokerstars live casino games is very high and well optimized to work well. The table games work better on the mobile apps.
The games and providers are some of the best you’ll find in the industry. Pokerstars’ investment in the live casino section is really commendable. You can play any of the live games without any issue.
Pokerstars does not have a special welcome offer for casino players, but there’s a Spin n Go offer, and this is how it works. PokerStars has three Spin & Go games. Spin & Go Hold’em is the version where three players play for random prizes that can go up to $1 million, based on the buy-in.
The second is the Spin & Go Omaha, and it is similar, but it uses the Omaha poker style. Spin & Go Max is a twist where 3–8 players join, and the number of players is chosen at random before the game starts. All of the Spin & Go games have their unique rules and can be found on the promotion page of the casino.
In addition to the Casino bonus, there are extra features to give you a better gaming experience. Many of the casino games, especially sports, have a demo mode to help you practice before placing real money bets. To access the demo mode, you need to have registered and verified your account, because without logging in, you cannot access this feature. There’s also the filter and search feature that helps you find your preferred games.
Our professional opinion on PokerStars is that it is a very strict bookmaker that takes security and responsible gambling very seriously. Navigating through Pokerstars is not difficult because every game is arranged in a format that is easy to find. Some of the features we find particularly interesting are the search tool and the just-included live streaming, which is a game-changer for Pokerstars.
The search tool makes finding sports and markets fast. PokerStars covers top sports from all over the world, and also Irish favourites like GAA events and hurling. One area where Pokerstars lacks is in the area of bonuses and promotions. They currently do not have a welcome offer for the sportsbook section; it’s one of the few bookmakers to not have any welcome bonus for sports. PokerStars is fair, they have some of the best football odds, and their mobile app covers up for the mobile site lapses.
