Overview: Launched in 2004, Full Tilt enjoyed enormous popularity amongst online poker players until the site came crashing down in 2011 as a result of the infamous Black Friday. The company was unable to pay back players who had lost funds though the site, and consequently lost many fans. However, former online poker rivals, PokerStars, stepped in to purchase Full Tilt and paid back all its out-of-pocket players, allowing the site to flourish again. It has grown from strength to strength since then and is now one of the most popular poker sites on the web.

The Competition: Full Tilt now focuses on the recreational poker player, having been a home for experienced professionals in its former life. Now more of a destination for casual players, who tend to congregate in the lower stakes game, its now one of the softest sites around. This ensures new players don’t feel out of place, and more experienced players know they’ve plenty of fish available to them.

Cash Games: Full Tilt offers a selection of Texas Hold’em, Omaha Hi/Lo, Omaha Hi, Razz, Stud Hi, Stud Hi/Lo, 5 Card Stud, Draw Poker and Irish Poker.

Promotions: New players to the site can avail of a 100% first deposit bonus up to $600 (which clears at the rate of $1 for every 25 Full Tilt Points). Full Tilt offers welcome freerolls (whereby a player’s first deposit allows them entry to any free-to-play poker tournaments over 30 days). They can play for a share of $200 in Ring Game Tickets or Tournament Tickets every day. The Boomerang allows players to get a second shot at tournament success if they don’t cash on their first try. Members of the Players Club get access to a $5K freeroll ticket, plus a random prize of up to $1,000 cash, as well as the chance to win The Deal Jackpot.

Tournaments: Full Tilt’s tournaments are well-populated, fast and well structured, with buy-ins starting from as little as $1, all the way up into the thousands. Full Tilt’s Sunday Major has $75,000 in guaranteed prize money every Sunday, and the Sunday Brawl is a chance to earn cash for each opponent players are able to knock out in the $40,000 Knockout Bounty Tournament. There are plenty of satellites to win a place at big live and online events like the WPT, WSOP or the FTOPS series. Full Tilt runs plenty of freerolls in all game varieties, not just Texas Hold’em, which is a nice bonus.

Software: Full Tilt claims to offer the best online poker software in the world, designed by poker players for poker players. Their site undoubtedly does have pretty impressive features, including self-imposed poker stakes and casino wages limits, emotional avatars, seat selection, choice of background themes, and hotkeys. Their option for multi-table play support play at 18 tables simultaneously, and has the choice of basic view for beginners and standard for more advanced players. The site’s variety of customization options, fast game play, attractive graphics and high reliability ensure its popularity is well-founded.

Banking: Full Tilt offers variety of safe, secure, and easy methods for depositing money into accounts. Since the two sites are interlinked, players have the option of ‘account pairing’ if they hold accounts with both Full Tilt Poker and PokerStars, so they can effectively transfer funds from accounts on one site to the other. The site also provides a nifty Single Click Deposit feature (so players can fund their Full Tilt Poker account almost instantly).

Customer Service: Full Tilt Poker’s customer support services was not previously well rated, but had improved vastly since the site was acquired by PokerStars. Although it does not have live support, the email option is perfectly functional and fast.

Why Join?: Full Tilt is esteemed by online poker fans everywhere. Despite the unfortunate consequences of Black Friday, the site has rebuilt itself as a trustworthy and reliable site with faultless software features and excellent opportunities for recreational players.