Preflop Raise Sizing: How Big is Too Big?

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A question I get asked frequently in coaching sessions revolves around preflop raise sizing and the various options we have available to us in MTTs. It’s usually some variation of “how big should I raise preflop ‘as standard’?” or “how big should I usually raise preflop?”, and it carries with it a few assumptions that I’d like to challenge in this article.

The most important of those assumptions is that we should have a ‘standard’ preflop raise sizing that we use in the majority of situations – I don’t believe this is the case. We should be adaptable in using the sizing most appropriate to the hand we’re playing. Let me outline a few issues that we should be considering when we decide on a preflop raise sizing in a specific hand.

How ‘three times the big blind’ went out of style

A long time ago – about ten years ago, which seems like forever in poker terms – it was considered more or less acceptable to raise three times the big blind in almost all situations, regardless of context. Before that point (i.e. before online poker really became a thing) nobody had ever really challenged this idea, for two reasons – firstly, nobody had ever been able to play a sufficient volume of poker that they could test out different raise sizes and measure results reliably, and secondly, technology that could calculate optimal raises sizes mathematically did not exist.

The reason raising to 3x became so popular is because at some point, somebody figured out that it was the sizing that would allow stacks to get all-in on the river in a 100bb deep cash game pot, if you bet full-pot every street (you raise 3x pre, bet 7.5bb on flop, 22.5bb on turn, 67bb on river). This was back in the day when cash-game poker was the norm, and playing with short stacks was much less common. But then tournament poker really took off, and everything changed.

People started recognizing that when you’re playing with stacks shorter than 100bb, it doesn’t take anywhere near as much betting on early streets in order to get those stacks all-in by the river. Online players were able to play hundreds of thousands of hands a year thanks to the rapid growth of sites like PokerStars, and suddenly people were experimenting with everything from 25bb push-fold poker to minraising at 200bb. The rules had suddenly changed, and by the time 2008 or 2009 rolled around, minraising in tournaments had become extremely commonplace.

The impact of postflop play

You’ll note that it was an awareness of postflop possibilities that led people to decrease their raise sizing originally – they recognized that with stacks shorter than 100bb, more maneuverability in postflop play could be created by decreasing their raise sizings. They wouldn’t be so easily committed to getting stacks all-in, and they could generate extra leverage by forcing their opponents to adapt their preflop ranges to unexpected sizings.

These changes further manifested themselves in smaller c-bet sizing, smaller 3-bets, and eventually more defending of the blinds, until tournament poker became what it is today. Today, players are aware that they don’t have to stick to any prescribed ‘model’ of what their postflop betsizing should be, because they recognize that adapting their sizings is necessary.

The curious thing is, that while many players are content to adopt exploitative postflop strategies based on interpretations of villains’ ranges and board runouts, most players don’t change their preflop sizing. They’re too afraid of being exploited or giving away information, so they just stick with 2x or 2.5x in most situations and hope for the best. But given the information we know so far – that the reasons people have changed their common raise sizings and bet sizings over the years have mostly been because of the influence of changing stack sizes – shouldn’t it be possible to come up with a better model? Well, the answer is yes, and it’s surprisingly simple.

A flexible blueprint for success

When it comes to choosing our raise sizings, we must first be aware of which paradigm we are operating within – are we trying to play GTO/unexploitably, or are we trying to exploit our opponents? When we’re raising preflop, especially in early position, we’re usually doing the former, since we often have multiple players left to act and can’t exploit them all at once. So in many cases, we have to come up with a sizing that fits the situation, regardless of how our opponents may respond to it.

In these situations, we should be choosing our raise sizing according to the average effective stack size. If the average stack behind us is 45bb, we’ll want to raise a sizing that gives us room to build a big pot and get all-in if we choose, but doesn’t commit too much in the event we want to fold the turn or river – 2.5bb should do the trick in this case. If the average stack behind is 15bb, we want maximum room to raise-fold or raise-call, meaning we just minraise. If stacks are 150bb, we should be going to at least 3x, probably 3.5x or 4x in order to capitalise on our ability to generate big pots and exercise an edge over deeper stacks.

However, in some cases, we’ll be operating within the opposite paradigm – trying to exploit our opponents based on reliable information and reads. This happens particularly in cases where we’re on the button or in the small blind, with only one or two players left to act behind us. In these cases, we have more freedom to choose our raise sizing according to will create the most opportunities for exploitation. This might mean raising 4x from a 30bb stack because we believe our opponents will fold too much, or it might mean minraising at 200bb deep if we want to focus on exploiting the villain postflop as often as possible. All options are on the table, as always, depending on how you perceive your opponents’ likely responses.

The final word

As with most situations in poker, we have to make a choice between whether we’re trying to stay unexploitable in a certain spot, or whether we’re trying to exploit our opponents. In the former situation, stack sizes should be the biggest determinant of preflop sizing; in the latter, it should be exploitative reads. Either way, however, it’s important to recognize that there are no ‘rules’, and nothing is ‘standard’. Step away from the desire to make decisions easier by imposing rules on yourself, and therein lies improvement.