Variance is poker's great equalizer—the element ensuring short-term luck influences results. Understanding variance protects your mental game and bankroll during inevitable downswings.
Defining Variance: Variance measures result dispersion around your expected value. High variance means large swings; low variance means steady results. All gambling involves variance, but skill reduces it over time.
Short-Term vs. Long-Term: In any single session, luck dominates results. Over thousands of hands, skill prevails. Recreational players misjudge poker because they experience too few hands to reach the long run.
Cash Game Variance: Cash games have lower variance than tournaments. Winning players typically have standard deviations of 60-100 big blinds per 100 hands. This means 95% of results fall within two standard deviations of your win rate.
Tournament Variance: Tournaments are extremely high variance. Even top players cash only 10-15% of tournaments. Multi-tournament packages and large sample sizes are essential for evaluating tournament ability.
Downswing Duration: Winning players experience months-long downswings. A 3bb/100 winner might endure 100,000-hand breakeven stretches or worse. These streaks don't indicate changed skill—they're mathematical certainty.
Bad Beat Stories: Everyone runs bad sometimes. What matters is whether you made correct decisions, not results. Sharing bad beat stories perpetuates victim mentality. Focus on decisions, not outcomes.
Reducing Variance: Game selection, conservative play, and proper bankroll management reduce variance impact. Playing fewer tables improves decision quality, lowering variance from mistakes. However, some variance is unavoidable.
Psychological Impact: Downswings test every player's mental game. Maintain confidence in your process by tracking decisions, not results. Review hands objectively, separating bad outcomes from bad decisions.
Preventing Tilt: Recognize tilt warning signs—frustration, impatience, and revenge-seeking. When tilting, end the session immediately. No session is so good that playing on tilt is profitable.
Variance and Bankroll: Proper bankroll management ensures variance doesn't end your poker career. Underbankrolled players can't weather downswings, forcing them to play scared or quit.
Sample Size Awareness: Don't overreact to small samples. Hundreds of hands prove nothing; tens of thousands reveal trends; hundreds of thousands approach truth. Be patient when evaluating your performance.
Healthy Perspective: Accept variance as poker's nature. If you need immediate, consistent results, poker isn't suitable. Winners embrace variance as the cost of exploiting weaker players.
Responsible Gaming: If downswings trigger anxiety, depression, or desperate gambling, seek help. Variance shouldn't threaten your mental health or financial stability. The National Council on Problem Gambling provides free resources.