Texas Hold'em Tip on Poker Tells

Poker tells are unintentional gestures poker players do when faced with a poker situation. An intentional poker face may also be a tell at times when a bluff becomes too obvious that it comes out to be a tell.

To be an effective tell detector in Hold'em here are several Texas Hold'em tips on spotting poker tells.

The chip mannerism is an important poker tell to watch out for. Aggressive tossing of the chips or flicking them on the table with a matching grunt is playing obvious. The player does not realize that his desire to show off a "good" situation is too obvious so that a good poker tell detector sees through the player's real situation. Being too obvious about showing off a "good" or "bad" poker situation is an obvious poker tell.

A good show of "good" situations is often too good to be true. Chances are, the player acting this out is in real trouble, and all we have to do is call his raise or raise the bet. A good show of "bad" situations is often the opposite. The player probably has a strong hand and just wants to raise more funds for the pot.

Another Texas Hold'em tip on poker tells is a player's mouth. The mouth is a good gauge of one's real situation—if we know how to interpret what a person is really saying behind the pretended statements. A player may be saying one thing but a good poker tell detector will be able to spot the lie. Watch out for a player who talks plenty and aggressively. Be sure that there's a cover-up somewhere. Like they say, barking dogs seldom bite.

But don't get this wrong: differentiate aggressive from confident talk. Too much talk may mean a harmless hand, but minced words may do have something. If the talk seems more desperate than confident, the talker has nothing. If the player talks and is genuinely having a good time at it, the person is someone to reckon with.

Finally, watch how a player stares or looks. This is an important Texas Hold'em tip. There's a thing called a dead stare—the player is looking at us in the eye but then the player seems to be staring at nothing. This is sometimes accompanied by a slightly opened mouth. Some players will want to make this a threatening look but the dead stare gives them away.

These Texas Hold'em tips are valuable for telling a winner from a loser.