Poker Bankroll Calculator
Enter your bankroll, pick your format, add your win rate and rakeback, then choose a risk level.
This calculator runs the Mason Malmuth risk of ruin formula on your own numbers. It returns the highest stakes you can safely play, the buy-ins that stake requires, your risk of going broke, your risk of dropping a level, and the thresholds for moving up or down.
Rakeback is included in the calculation because it is real profit. A deal can cut the bankroll a stake requires by more than half.
Looking for the maths rather than the tool? Jump straight to the risk of ruin formula and worked example.
Calculate Your Stakes
How to Use This Calculator
The calculator takes five inputs. Two are required, and the other three sharpen the answer considerably.
Leave the win rate and rakeback fields blank and you get a conservative default. Fill them in and you get a figure calculated on your actual edge rather than an assumption.
Enter your bankroll
Your total poker bankroll in dollars. Do not include living expenses, rent, bills, or emergency funds. Only count money you can deposit into a poker room without affecting your real life.
Select your game format
Each format carries its own standard deviation, and that figure drives everything else. NLHE full ring runs at 70 BB/100 while PLO 6-max runs at 140. Select MTT and a field size box appears, because field size affects tournament variance more than any other factor.
Enter your win rate
Cash players enter BB/100 from their tracking software. Tournament players enter ROI as a percentage. Leave it blank and the calculator uses a conservative default, but your own number gives a far more accurate answer because required bankroll scales inversely with win rate.
Enter your rakeback
Rakeback is real profit, so it belongs in your win rate. A 2 BB/100 winner at micro stakes with a 30% deal is effectively winning at 4.40 BB/100, which more than halves the bankroll they need. Enter 0 if you have no deal.
Choose your risk tolerance
These are real risk of ruin targets, not labels. Conservative solves for a 5% chance of losing the roll, Moderate for 10%, and Aggressive for 20%. Pick Conservative if poker pays your bills.
Read your results
You get your recommended stake, the buy-ins required against the buy-ins you hold, your effective win rate after rakeback, two separate risk figures, a move-up target, and a move-down threshold. If the required buy-ins exceed what you hold, drop a level or lower your risk tolerance.
How Many Buy-ins Do You Need?
The number of buy-ins you need depends on your win rate, the game’s standard deviation, and your acceptable risk of ruin. Nothing else moves the number much.
Every figure below is generated by the same formula the calculator runs, at the win rate shown in the second column. Change the win rate and the whole row changes, which is why a fixed rule of thumb like “30 buy-ins” is close to meaningless without knowing your edge.
For the wider context on managing a roll across a career, see our poker bankroll management guide.
| Format | Win Rate Assumed | Conservative (5% RoR) | Moderate (10% RoR) | Aggressive (20% RoR) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| NLHE Cash 6-Max | 2 BB/100 | 61 | 47 | 33 |
| NLHE Cash Full Ring | 2 BB/100 | 37 | 29 | 20 |
| Zoom / Fast-Fold 6-Max | 2 BB/100 | 75 | 58 | 41 |
| Live NLHE Cash | 5 BB/100 | 30 | 24 | 17 |
| PLO Cash 6-Max | 3 BB/100 | 98 | 76 | 53 |
| Sit & Go | 5% ROI | 92 | 71 | 50 |
| Spin & Go | 3% ROI | 200 | 154 | 108 |
| MTT (up to 200 runners) | 15% ROI | 123 | 95 | 66 |
| MTT (201 to 1,000) | 15% ROI | 250 | 192 | 135 |
| MTT (1,001 to 5,000) | 15% ROI | 562 | 432 | 302 |
| MTT (5,000+) | 15% ROI | 999 | 768 | 537 |
Standard deviation enters the formula squared, so the differences between formats compound. PLO at 140 BB/100 against NLHE full ring at 70 is double the standard deviation but four times the bankroll at the same win rate. The table shows a smaller gap only because it credits PLO players with a higher assumed win rate.
MTT variance is the highest of any format, and field size is the reason. A 200-runner field and a 5,000-runner field at the same ROI differ by a factor of eight in required bankroll.
The Spin and Go figure deserves a note. Our standard deviation for that format excludes jackpot multipliers above 25x, which fire in roughly 0.2% of games. Those are upside events, so including them inflates variance without adding any risk of going broke.
Understanding Your Calculator Results
Three inputs move the result: your win rate after rakeback, your format’s standard deviation, and the risk of ruin you are willing to accept. Everything the calculator returns follows from those three numbers.
Understanding Risk of Ruin in Poker
Risk of ruin is the probability that you lose your entire bankroll before it grows indefinitely, assuming you keep playing the same stake with the same edge and never move down.
It is a worst case by design. In practice players drop a level when the roll shrinks, which is why the calculator also returns your risk of reaching the move-down threshold. That second number is always the smaller of the two and it is the one that reflects how people actually play.
Here is the formula the calculator runs, and how to work it by hand:
RoR = exp(-2 × WR × BR / SD²)
The Mason Malmuth risk of ruin formula, as used by the calculator above
- RoR Probability of losing the entire bankroll, expressed as a decimal. 0.10 is a 10% chance.
- WR Win rate in BB/100 for cash games, or ROI as a decimal for tournaments. Rakeback is added here.
- BR Bankroll in big blinds for cash games, or in buy-ins for tournaments. One buy-in is 100 big blinds.
- SD Standard deviation in the same units as the win rate. Variance is SD squared, which is why it dominates the result.
- exp Euler's number e raised to the power of the expression, roughly 2.718.
BR = SD² × ln(1 / RoR) / (2 × WR)
Rearranged to solve for the bankroll a chosen risk of ruin requires
Worked example: 2 BB/100 winner at NL25 6-max, 10% risk of ruin
BR = 90² × ln(1 / 0.10) / (2 × 2)
BR = 8,100 × 2.3026 / 4
BR = 4,663 big blinds
BR = 47 buy-ins, or $1,166 at NL25
Now add a 30% rakeback deal. Micro stakes rake runs around 8 BB/100, so the deal returns 2.40 BB/100 and the effective win rate becomes 4.40. Rerun the same formula and the requirement falls to 22 buy-ins, or $530. Same player, same game, less than half the bankroll.
Notice that standard deviation is squared while win rate is not. Doubling your win rate halves the bankroll you need. Doubling your standard deviation quadruples it.
For how variance behaves over a sample and why downswings run deeper than intuition suggests, see our variance in poker guide.
Rake and Rakeback
Rakeback is profit, so the calculator adds it to your win rate rather than treating it as a discount on rake. That distinction matters, because required bankroll scales inversely with win rate and not with rake.
Rake paid is assumed at 8 BB/100 at micro stakes, 6 at low, and 4 at mid and above. A 30% deal at micro therefore returns 2.40 BB/100, which turns a 2 BB/100 winner into a 4.40 BB/100 winner and cuts the required bankroll from 47 buy-ins to 22.
Enter your own deal in the rakeback field to see the effect on your numbers. For how rakeback shapes game selection and volume decisions, see our rakeback and strategy guide.
Reading the Move Up and Move Down Numbers
The move-up target is the bankroll at which the next stake carries the same risk of ruin you selected. It is not a fixed buy-in count, because the answer depends on your edge.
The move-down threshold is the bankroll at which your current stake tips into the next risk tier. On Moderate you move down when the roll implies 20% risk of ruin rather than 10%.
Both are derived from your inputs rather than from a rule of thumb. For the wider question of when to take a shot and how to handle the drop back, see our guide to moving up stakes.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ)
What is the difference between a bankroll calculator and a variance calculator?
A bankroll calculator tells you how many buy-ins you need and what stakes you can safely play right now. A variance calculator projects the range of possible outcomes over thousands of hands or tournaments based on your win rate and standard deviation. Use the bankroll calculator for stake selection. Use the variance simulator to model long-term swings and set realistic expectations.
How does rakeback affect my bankroll calculator results?
Rakeback is profit, so the calculator adds it to your win rate rather than treating it as a discount on rake. A 30% deal at micro stakes returns roughly 2.40 BB/100, which turns a 2 BB/100 winner into a 4.40 BB/100 winner. Required bankroll scales inversely with win rate, so that deal cuts the buy-ins you need from 47 to 22 at a 10% risk of ruin. Enter your deal in the rakeback field to see your own numbers, or compare what is available on our poker rakeback deals page.
Which poker formats does this calculator support?
Eight formats. Cash games cover NLHE 6-max, NLHE full ring, Zoom and fast-fold, live NLHE and PLO 6-max. Tournaments cover Sit and Gos, Spin and Gos and multi-table tournaments, with MTTs split by field size because field size drives tournament variance more than any other factor. Each format carries its own standard deviation, so the answer changes when you change the dropdown.
How many hands do I need before trusting my win rate?
At minimum 50,000 hands. At that sample your win rate can still swing by 0.5 BB/100 due to variance. At 100,000 hands the confidence interval tightens to roughly 0.25 BB/100. Until you hit 100,000 hands, enter a win rate 1 BB/100 lower than your average and treat the result as your floor.
What happens if my actual win rate is lower than I estimated?
Required bankroll is inversely proportional to win rate, so halving your win rate doubles the bankroll you need. A player who enters 2 BB/100 but actually wins at 1 BB/100 needs 94 buy-ins where the calculator told them 47. This is the single biggest bankroll killer: the gap between what you think you win and what you actually win. Track your results over a large sample before committing to a stake level.