Why should you use a HUD?
A HUD (heads up display) is like an extension to your brain, it helps you:
Remember things about your opponents you would've otherwise forgotten
See tendencies you could easily miss without a HUD
See more opportunities to make uncommon adjustments
Make more thin value bets
Make folds vs certain opponents, that normally would be 'coolers'
Make 'hero calls' that look like soul reads
But you shouldn’t use use just any HUD
Let’s take a look at a user friendly HUD and not so user friendly HUD
Not user friendly HUD
- One box of stats
- Not enough stats – not enough info
- Too many stats – hard to find the right stats from the wall of numbers, can’t get the info needed
- Hard to place, because of size and shape
- Stat colours hard to distinguish from the background – hard to see dark (red) stats on dark background
- A couple of big popups – hard to find the right stats
- Lots of small popups – every stat has a popup with couple of stats – hard to remember where’s the popup you need
- Badly/inconsistently formatted popups – hard to find the right stats, if every popup uses different logic
User friendly HUD
- A HUD with multiple panels
- Easy to find the right stats, because of less stats per panel
- Separate panels for different situations – more situations covered
- Easy to place around the player, because of smaller panels
- Stat colours which stand out from the HUD background – easy to see, extra points for colour coded stats
- Popups which cover one situation thoroughly, assigned to a related HUD panel – easy to find the needed popups and stats
- Popups with a consistent formatting and logical stat placements – easy to find the right stats
The cash game HUD
The Cash Game HUD
For cash games, you need a HUD, which has more emphasis on post-flop play.
You still need the standard raise first in stats by position and other preflop stats. But as the stacks are deeper than in MTT’s and SnG’s, there is more post-flop play and you need more info than just the standard c-bet and fold to c-bet.
You need stats which differentiate, not just between single raised pots (2bet pots) and 3bet pots, but also between how your opponents act, if they are in position (IP), or out of position (OOP). Knowing how your opponents approach the game, when they are IP or OOP post-flop, will give you a whole new level of understanding about their game. Which will in turn help you make even better adjustments, and increase your winrate.
Don’t miss out on that – check out the cash game HUD’s today!
The +EV MTT/SnG HUD
If you are playing MTT’s or SnG’s, then you need a HUD, which shows you dedicated stats for situations, that often take place in those games.
The biggest emphasis should be put to pre-flop, because the stacks are mostly short, and you need to be precise with your pre-flop actions – 1 mistake could mean the end of your tournament life – and we definitely wouldn’t want that to happen.
Pre-flop is very important, but this doens’t mean that post-flop play should be ignored. Depending on the structure, there could still be plenty of post-flop play left in the game. Post-flop is also where the biggest edges can be gained, which is why the +EV HUD’s also come with lots of post-flop stats that cover almost all imaginable situations.
One of the most important part of tournament poker is stealing the blinds. That’s why you should have specific stats for stealing, reacting to steals, and how the stealer reacts to re-steals.
These things are all covered in the +EV MTT/SnG HUD’s, and there’s plenty more.
The Spin&Go HUD
Spin&Go’s are a very specific poker game – they are palyed 3-handed and also with very short stacks. This means you also need a very specific HUD for those games – you definitely shouldn’t use a default HUD for Spin&Go’s. You need stats for different stack depths, because the game is very different with effective stacks 15bb+, than it is, for ex. under 10bb deep. And since there are only 3 players, you have enough space on the table to have separate HUD panels for each position and also position vs position.
Another important part of Spin&Go’s is heads up, which is quite a bit different than a 3-handed game, so you also need a different HUD, which is specifically dedicated to the heads up part of the game. The +EV Spin&Go HUD includes 2 HUD’s: a 3-handed HUD and a heads up HUD, so you can have the best info for both parts of the game, which will help you make the best decisions while playing.
If you’re a Spin&Go player, then check out the +EV Spin&Go HUD!
The Heads Up HUD
Heads up is very different compared to the games with 3-10 players. In 3+ handed games, the SB is out of position vs the BB, but in heads up, SB is always in position, and is also the button. And since both players post the blinds every hand, the ranges in play are also a lot wider, which means a lot more info can be had about your opponent. This also means you need a HUD which covers way more situations than a default HUD – having VPIP and PFR on your HUD for heads up is pretty close to useless – you need specific stats that differentiate between the SB(BTN) and the BB. For post-flop, you should also have a lot more stats than just c-bet and fold vs cbet stats – there’s also plenty of room on the table for more stats, so you should take advantage of that free space.
The +EV Heads Up HUD covers both, the pre-flop and post-flop situations in great detail.
Free HUD’s
Besides free trials of the premium +EV HUD’s, you can also get absolutely free HUD for the game you play.
If you are new to HUD’s and think you might be overwhelmed by the premium HUD’s, then you might want to get one of the free HUD’s first. And then later on, when you’re more familiar with HUD’s, get a free trial of the premium HUD for your game. This way you can also take better advantage of the trial, if you’re already more familiar with the stats and the overall layout of the HUD.
Popups
If you already have a HUD you like, but would like to get some more advanced popups, then you can also get popups separately – without a HUD. This way you can just add the popups to your own HUD.
You can just choose the popups you need and get those – so you don’t have to pay for the popups you are not going to use, which could potentially be the case, if you buy a full HUD with all the popups. And in the future, if you feel you need popups for some more situations, then you can just get them later.
With separate popups you can build your own HUD for your specific needs!
+EV HUD’s
Helping you win more!
You can’t control the variance, but you can control how you play each hand. To play your hands better, you need to have the right information, laid out in an easy to access and understand way.
Don’t pass up on the edge that a properly set up HUD can give you. Get yourself a premium, or at least a free +EV HUD and improve your winrate and your life!