New York has yet to introduce real money online poker like its neighbors New Jersey and Pennsylvania. Legislation to do so has been considered, however, which means New York online poker could be added in the future. Meanwhile, NY poker players have options right now, such as at promotional social casino sites like Global Poker. Read on for an overview of the current status of online poker in New York, including where it stands and what its prospects are going forward.
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Can you play real money online poker in New York?
You cannot currently play online poker for real money in New York at sites like PokerStars, WSOP.com, or BetMGM Poker. Nor can you play online casino games for real money in NY, although legislation to authorize such games and sites has been introduced repeatedly over recent years.
Poker is offered at the state’s several tribal and commercial casinos. Those in NY can play cash games and tournaments in the poker rooms at such locations. The casinos occasionally host some large-field poker tournament series as well.
New York poker players do have an option, however, when it comes to playing poker online in the state. Social casinos offer opportunities to New Yorkers to play a variety of games online, including online poker. By far the most popular of these social sites to offer traditional player-versus-player online poker games is Global Poker.
Social poker in New York
By employing a sweepstakes model and using virtual currencies rather than cash, these poker sites are able to operate in states where traditional online poker is not available.
As noted, Global Poker is an example of such a site that welcomes players from New York and most other states across the US. Much like other social and sweepstakes casino sites, Global Poker uses two virtual currencies, called Gold Coins and Sweeps Coins.
Players can purchase Gold Coins and use them to play ring games and tournaments where they can win more Gold Coins. The Gold Coins have no actual cash value, and the games that use them might be thought of as “play money” games.
Players can receive Gold Coins for free when they sign up at Global Poker and at other times via various promotions and giveaways. However, when players purchase Gold Coins, they often receive as a bonus free Sweeps Coins. They can also use these Sweeps Coins to play in ring games and tournaments on the site where they can win more Sweeps Coins (or “SC”). Players can additionally collect Sweeps Coins by other methods, too, such as through social media giveaways and other promos. They cannot, however, purchase SC directly.
Once players have accumulated a certain number of Sweeps Coins, they can redeem them for cash prizes that they can then withdraw. Thus while social poker sites like Global Poker don’t use real money and never require players to purchase anything to play, they do offer ways to redeem winnings for cash prizes.
Are offshore poker sites safe for NY players?
You might encounter online poker sites operating outside of the US inviting NY players to play. However, such “offshore” poker sites present significant risks for players, and you should avoid them in favor of legal sites.
If you deposit funds and play at an offshore site, you do so without any of the protections a licensed and regulated poker site provides. Since offshore sites operate outside of New York jurisdiction, you have no legal recourse should you encounter any problems related to the security of their funds or game integrity.
If you suspect cheating, collusion, multi-accounting or other issues regarding the fairness of games on an offshore site, you have to hope the site’s security team will respond to your complaints and deal with them appropriately. But there are no guarantees, and no way to ensure against such issues arising. There have even been cases where such sites have shut down without notice, leaving players suddenly unable to access their accounts and with no legal means to try to recover their money.
The short answer, then, of whether it is safe to play on offshore sites is no, it is not. Fully legal, licensed and regulated sites are much preferable for US players.
When will real money online poker be legal in New Yor?
Online poker in NY has a number of supporters among the state’s lawmakers. In fact, they have been seriously discussing the possibility of legalizing online poker for many years, with legislation introduced every single year since 2014. While past efforts has failed to gain support to legalize online poker in New York, that has not deterred proponents.
The latest attempts to legalize NY online poker have been headed by New York Senator Joseph Addabbo who again released a bill in 2024. While Gov. Kathy Hochul did not include the bill in her 2025 executive budget, Addabbo said he will continue to push legalization with the hope it will finally cross the finish line.
Unlike during those early years when online poker failed to gain any legislative momentum, today online sports betting in New York is legal and thriving. Other examples of gambling expansion have occurred as well, meaning the landscape has shifted and perhaps New York online casinos and online poker will earn more acceptance going forward. Stay tuned!
Online poker options in New Jersey and Pennsylvania
As far as real money online poker options go, New York players can create accounts on legal online poker sites in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. They can even deposit funds from New York, if they wish. However, players must be physically within the applicable states in order to play online poker.
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Most of those sites are also available in Pennsylvania, with only PartyPoker not also live in PA.
The real money online poker rooms in NY and PA offer a great variety of cash games, sit and go’s, and multi-table tournaments. The sites primarily offer no-limit Texas hold’em as (by far) the most popular variant, although you will also find pot-limit Omaha games, SNGs, and tourneys. PokerStars additionally has seven-card stud and other variants, too, for those who enjoy mixed games.
Many New York poker players travel either to NJ or PA to participate in the big online tournament series that frequently run on WSOP.com and PokerStars. WSOP.com invites New Jersey players to compete for WSOP Online Circuit rings and even WSOP bracelets. Meanwhile in NJ PokerStars runs the New Jersey Championship of Online Poker (NJCOOP) and New Jersey Spring Championship of Online Poker (NJSCOOP), and in PA they host parallel PACOOP and PASCOOP series.
Some of the online poker sites in New Jersey are “ring-fenced,” meaning you can only compete against other players also located in NJ. However, the WSOP.com NJ site shares a player pool with the WSOP sites in Nevada and Michigan which means more cash tables and larger tournament prize pools. The PokerStars NJ site similarly shares its player pool with the PokerStars Michigan site.
Meanwhile, in Pennsylvania all of the sites are PA-only.
Live poker in New York
There are a number of live poker rooms in New York’s casinos. Poker rooms in the tribal casinos date back to the 1990s and 2000s, while commercial casino poker is newer, opening during the latter half of the 2010s. Here’s a quick look at the poker rooms in each of the four tribal casinos and four commercial casinos:
| Casino | Commercial/Tribal | Number of Tables |
|---|---|---|
| del Lago Resort & Casino | Commercial | 14 tables |
| Resorts World Catskills | Commercial | 19 tables |
| Rivers Casino & Resort | Commercial | 16 tables |
| Tioga Downs Casino and Resort | Commercial | 12 tables |
| Akwesasne Mohawk Casino Resort | Tribal | 5 tables |
| Seneca Niagara Casino & Hotel | Tribal | 23 tables |
| Seneca Allegany Resort & Casino | Tribal | 8 tables |
| Turning Stone Resort Casino | Tribal | 32 tables |
Also worth noting are the two commercial poker rooms at Casino Niagara (26 tables) and Fallsview Casino Resort (16 tables), both in Niagara Falls just over the border in Ontario, Canada.
Commercial vs. tribal casino poker rooms
Players must be 21 or older to play any of the games in New York’s commercial casinos, including poker. Tribal casinos, though, operate within their own jurisdictions. As a result, in some cases, the age requirement differs.
For example, the minimum age to play poker at the Akwesasne Mohawk Casino Resort, the Seneca Allegany Resort & Casino, and the Turning Stone Resort Casino is 18 years old. Seneca Niagara Casino & Hotel, however, requires players to be at least 21 to play.
Brief history of New York poker
While Las Vegas and Atlantic City might be more famous among most as poker destinations, New York has a long storied history when it comes to poker.
Underground poker clubs
When it comes to underground poker, New York is home to many of the most famous clubs in America. Books like The Thompson Street Poker Club and Queer Luck from the late 19th century chronicle such clubs and the characters who populated them, albeit in an embellished fashion.
Starting in 1919 and lasting into the early 1930s, another well-known poker club met regularly at the Algonquin Hotel in midtown Manhattan. The group consisted of actors, writers, poets, columnists and critics, and they called themselves the Thanatopsis Pleasure and Inside Straight Club. Given that members of the famed Algonquin Round Table took part, it’s no surprise there were many stories written about the games.
Such poker games weren’t technically legal, but they thrived nonetheless. New York eventually legalized other types of gambling, like pari-mutuel wagering on horse races (reinstated in 1940) and the state lottery (in 1967). Underground poker clubs remained illegal but could be found all over the five boroughs. Many clubs met in private homes or apartments, while others set up in restaurants, bars, office buildings and sometimes even in churches. A number of clubs convened at Hungarian restaurants commonly known as “goulash joints” or “ghoulies.”
Some of these clubs became quite famous, such as the Mayfair Club, which started as a bridge club before introducing backgammon, gin rummy and poker. Famous players like Stu Ungar, Erik Seidel, and Dan Harrington were among those who played poker at the Mayfair. Later, the writers of the 1998 film Rounders would draw inspiration from the Mayfair and model the fictional Chesterfield Club after it. Such clubs began encountering significant resistance from legal authorities, particularly during the mayoral tenure of Rudy Giuliani. The Mayfair was shut down in 2000, as were other clubs. Eventually, though, other establishments arose to take their place.
Poker in casinos & NY’s path to legalizing online poker
Meanwhile, other legal options for New York poker players were emerging. In 1993, the state’s first tribal casino opened, Turning Stone in Verona. Others followed, and in 2013, voters authorized an amendment allowing commercial casinos to open outside of New York City. The first of these opened a few years later, and as noted above you can play live poker at many of them.
As mentioned, online poker legislation has been a topic of legislative discussions in New York since 2014. At first, a few half-hearted bill submissions and discussions were all there was. However, in 2016, a bill passed through the Senate Racing, Gaming and Wagering Committee. It marked the first time online poker legislation moved beyond the introduction stage. The NY Senate passed the bill by a vote of 53-5, and things looked promising. However, the 2016 legislative session ended in June without any action from the State Assembly.
In 2017, the Senate passed similar legislation by a vote of 54-8. From there, online poker legislation looked like a good bet to go beyond where it had gone a year earlier. Unfortunately, like its predecessor, the bill never made it past the Assembly’s Standing Committee on Racing and Wagering.
The next two years, 2018 and 2019, proved to be quite frustrating for fans of online poker games. Although the demise of PASPA in 2018 was a boon for state legislatures and sports betting, it may have had a negative effect on the prospects for online poker in New York. Since the profit and tax potential for sports betting is so much higher than for online poker, many lawmakers made it clear that online sports betting would happen before online poker had a chance.
Another court ruling further wounded the prospects of online poker in New York. Online poker bills filed by State Sens. John Bonacic and, later, Joe Addabbo both relied upon the argument that poker was predominantly a skill game. However, a state court ruled that the skill argument was invalid for daily fantasy sports, and created a precedent that would apply to online poker, too. In 2020, a state appellate court upheld the lower court’s finding.
Between the blossoming of sports betting and the legal challenges, New York’s 2018 online poker bills died uneventful deaths without floor votes. Because sports betting became the en vogue topic, refiled bills didn’t even have the same level of momentum in 2019 or 2020. However, New Yorkers who want online poker can take solace in the fact that they do have some steadfast champions in the legislature. In addition to Addabbo, who took up the torch after Bonacic retired in 2019, State Assemblymen Gary Pretlow and Clyde Vanel have also acted positively toward online poker legislation. With that said, the end of 2020 seemed to put online sports betting in the spotlight, as Gov. Andrew Cuomo reversed his stance and endorsed the practice.
Is online poker in the cards for New York?
Over recent years the focus has largely moved away from legalizing online poker in particular, with most of the new bills instead concentrating on online casinos. While such legislation might well include provisions to legalize online poker as well, it is probably much more likely that online casinos would launch first in NY before any of the major online poker operators go live in the state.
In any event, there’s always a chance the next legislative card to be turned over might be a favorable one and online poker in New York could be legalized.