Online poker has gotten off to a hot start in New Jersey. According to PokerScout, which tracks online poker traffic, an average of 460 cash game players are playing at regulated New Jersey sites at any one time.
The primary catalyst behind this fairly large number is Party (Poker) Borgata, which boast a rolling seven-day average of 230 cash game players per hour. Out of the 74 poker networks operating throughout the world, Party Borgata are already ranked 31st.
WSOP.com are also experiencing a fair amount of success in New Jersey so far. Running on 888 software, WSOP currently draw 140 cash game players an hour. This ranks 37th in the world, which is exactly in the middle.
The third biggest online poker room in New Jersey right now is 888’s own site, AAPN. They draw an hourly average of 70 cash game players, which makes up about 15% of New Jersey’s market. One more site worth discussing is Ultimate Poker, which are only garnering about 20 cash game players per hour.
After discussing these numbers, we can’t help but move to the inevitable comparisons to the Nevada online poker operation, which have been open over 6 months longer. At this time, Nevada only boast a 7-day average of 175 cash game players per hour. This is less than 40% of the traffic that New Jersey’s poker market have been getting. WSOP.com lead the way in Nevada with 95 players an hour, while Ultimate Poker attract 80 players per hour.
It’s not hard to understand why New Jersey’s poker market is doing much better than Nevada. For starters, New Jersey’s population is much larger at 8,864,590 people. Nevada, on the other hand, has just 2,758,931 residents. Another reason for New Jersey’s success is the fact that they have six poker sites, as opposed to just two in the Silver State.
One more point worth mentioning is that New Jersey poker is in its infancy, so the newness could be helping drive up the numbers. But on the other hand, one could also focus on the thousands of potential New Jersey players who have been slow to sign up, leading the way for continued growth in the Garden State.