Before we delve deeper into specific Spin & Go strategies, there are a few points to consider that will help you to get off to a great start. First, it’s important to adjust your expectations before jumping head first. Spin & Gos can be profitable. But they can also be a grind with big swings in results.

We’ll also take a look at bankroll management strategies for Spin & Gos, as well as touching on the basics of preflop and postflop strategy.

This page follows on from Lesson 1: Spin & Go Basics, where we introduce the format.

Adjusting Expectations for Spin & Gos

With a long term approach and profitable strategy, it’s very much possible to beat Spin & Gos. Having said that, you’ll need to manage your expectations about what that’s going to look like, particularly when it comes to the frequency of multipliers and your overall ROI.

Frequency of Multipliers

Players who are new to Spin & Gos often fall for the false expectation that they will hit huge multipliers straight away. This is unlikely to happen. The higher multipliers are incredibly rare in Spin & Gos, so most of the time you’ll be playing for multipliers of 2x to 5x the buy-in.

On average, it’s going to take hundreds of games before you see one or two higher multipliers, so quite a bit of your expected value will be locked up until you put in the volume needed to hit bigger scores.

So, before you even start your run, make sure you go into Spin & Gos with a realistic attitude and be prepared to grind out a profit at the lower multipliers until a jackpot spin hits. The exact frequencies of Spin & Go multipliers and other details about the game are available on PokerStars.

ROI

Because of the fast pace of Spin & Gos, combined with the relatively soft player pools, it’s tempting to think that you’ll be able to profit rapidly from Spin & Gos. However, even the best Spin players in the world only have a small ROI that is typically in the single digit range, such as 5 – 8 percent.

This is very different to other formats of poker. In MTTs, a proficient pro may expect to achieve an ROI of 15 – 20 percent, maybe higher in a live tournament field. Cash game ROIs for top players also tend to be higher than a single a digit.

This is because, although the field is soft, the short stacked, hyper turbo format makes it difficult to gain a huge edge in the same way you might do in a slower, deep stack game. The winner takes all format makes it difficult to gain consistent results, while the lottery multiplier also increases variance, meaning your ROI will often run lower than your chip EV.

All is not lost, though. The lower ROI of Spin & Gos is somewhat compensated for by the speed of the games, which allows you to put tonnes of volume in a short space of time. The ROI is lower, but hourly win rates can still be competitive due to the ability to grind volume.

Variance and Chip EV

Variance is a statistical measure of how much your actual results fluctuate from your expected win rate. It is the short term upswings and downswings in your results. Variance can manifest in different ways, such as being constantly card dead or losing all ins with the best hands, or picking up solid hands but hitting a cold deck.

Variance is surprisingly high in Spin & Gos for reasons we’ve already mentioned; the format and multiplier element.

You can’t control variance. However, the greater your edge over the field, the lower your variance will be and the less impact it has on your results. So, you should focus on what you can control, which is improving your poker strategy.

Expert tip: You can use a stat called Chip EV to measure your own performance in smaller samples, as Chip EV isn’t subject to the results of single outcomes or variance in multipliers. When compared to ROI, it can show you how far under or over expectation your results are running. You can also use programs like SwongSim to simulate variance and results.

In the long run, volume beats variance and your true win rate will emerge.

“Volume beats variance”

Bankroll Management

Bankroll management is one of the most overlooked aspects of playing poker for profit, yet it’s absolutely essential for serious players, especially in high variance games like Spin & Gos.

Without a solid bankroll, you could experience a costly downswing that can force you to go broke or reload. Bankroll management drastically reduces the chances that this will happen to winning players, as you’ll be playing at a buy-in level that allows you to absorb these bad runs.

A conservative bankroll strategy for Spin & Gos is to have around 200 buy-ins. So, if you’re playing the $1 Spins, you’ll start with $200. For $5 games, you’ll need around $1,000.

As well as cushioning you against variance, having a bankroll will allow you to play consistently well because you won’t be scared money.

If you want to move up in stakes, you’ll need to build your bankroll up to the appropriate level so that you can still stick to the figures above. So, if you’re moving from $1 to $2 Spin & Gos, you’ll need to grind up from $200 to $400 before making the full transition in stakes.

Preflop and Postflop Strategy

We won’t go into too much detail about the specifics of preflop and postflop strategy just yet, as these will be covered in full during the remaining Spin & Go Lessons. Right now, we’ll touch on certain points that you need to know before we delve deeper.

Preflop:

• Preflop strategy is very important in and of itself, as well as to set up postflop action.
• You can use clearly defined preflop ranges as your starting point for Spin & Go strategy.
• Spin & Go decisions are based on effective stacks in big blinds. If your opponent has a shorter stack, you are playing to their stack depth.
• Apply your raising and calling ranges based on effective stacks.
• We recommend changing your chip stacks to big blinds for simplicity, especially as you start to increase your volume.

Postflop:

• Postflop strategy is important because this is where you’ll gain your biggest edge when opponents make mistakes.
• Ranges are extremely wide in Spin & Gos, which leads to some unusual looking postflop moves.
• Bet sizing is often adjusted for Spin & Go. For example, it’s not uncommon to use quarter pot flop bets, allowing you to bet a wider range that includes bluffs even with a short stack.
• Spin & Go gameplay favours a highly aggressive style.

GTO versus Exploitative Play

Let’s wrap up the lesson with a quick point about Game Theory Optimal (GTO) play. This can scare new players and may even be viewed as pointless and irrelevant. It’s not. GTO gives you a solid baseline for a strategy that works against most player pools and is especially effective against GTO-aware opponents.

Generally, GTO is a pretty safe bet when it comes to taking action. For example, if the GTO solution says you can raise A-3 offsuit from a particular position, you can’t go far wrong. When it comes to reactive play, GTO can land you in trouble. If the suggestion is to call a shove with J-T suited, for example, yet your opponent isn’t shoving as wide as they should be, calling here could be a disaster.

Although it’s definitely useful, GTO won’t always give you the best strategy or most profitable betting line to use against a particular player. Usually, you’ll be looking to adjust your ranges and bet sizing to exploit your reads on the table. If you have the information to do so, adjusting will always be superior.

The next Spin & Go Lesson will focus on playing preflop from the button.