Are Sit’n’Go’s still worth grinding nowadays?

Back in the day, SNGs were one of the best formats to build a bankroll. With today’s environment and tougher player pools, do you think Sit’n’Go’s are still worth it, or is it better to just focus on MTTs or cash games?

MTTs are extremely poor for bankroll building, because variance is large, they require a lot of time commitment, and there is not enough game selection, if you have a small bankroll like $100 or $200. So the choise is still between cash games and SnGs. And while SnGs have clearly become tougher, than they were 15 years ago, so have cash games.

So at the end of the day its largely about personal preference. Try both and see, which format you like more, and then make a choise. Some sites like GG Poker and 888 Poker dont even give you a choise, because they dont even offer SnGs. So if you want to build a bankroll of those sites, there is no other choise than cash games. When you have $500 or so, you can consider moving to MTTs at least during weekend and holidays.

My winning was done mainly on Stars SNGs. Now I think they are bot ridden, or overloaded with Russians. The last one I played there were only Russians on the table. Needless to say, I don't play SNGs anymore.

okeedokalee said:

My winning was done mainly on Stars SNGs. Now I think they are bot ridden, or overloaded with Russians. The last one I played there were only Russians on the table. Needless to say, I don't play SNGs anymore.

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Yes this is pretty obvious, since you dont even know, that PokerStars withdrew from the russian market 3½ years ago. So there are literally no players from Russia in any games on PokerStars, and the games are also not "bot ridden", since PokerStars have excellent security. The real issue is, you kind of have to play mainly On Demand games, because the rake is to high for most of the single table formats, after they increased it in 2024.

Grid3004 said:

Back in the day, SNGs were one of the best formats to build a bankroll. With today’s environment and tougher player pools, do you think Sit’n’Go’s are still worth it, or is it better to just focus on MTTs or cash games?

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Yeah, SNGs are (were) definitely the best way to build a BR, except that nowadays, they are disappearing a little by little as most sites are pushing players towards Spin & Go, Rush & Gold and all that " Speedy Bingo" stuff that is more profitable for them.
They also prefer that people fill up the cash game tables. So, if you are a grinder, the latter is what's left for you, unless you have a BR that could sustain the variance of the MTTs.

najisami said:

They also prefer that people fill up the cash game tables. So, if you are a grinder, the latter is what's left for you, unless you have a BR that could sustain the variance of the MTTs.

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SnGs still run 24 hours on PokerStars, and on ACR Poker there is far more activity in SnGs than time scheduled MTTs. So while the SnGs scene is not, what it was a decade ago, its completely wrong to claim, that its no longer an option to grind SnGs. There are still plenty of people doing this, just not as many as 10 years ago.

Activity in mid and high stakes SnGs is very limited, but that not an issue, if you are trying to work your way up through micro and low stakes games to build a bankroll. It just mean, that at some point you will need to gravitate towards MTTs, if you want to move up further. The top of the leaderbord on PokerStars for 2025 is tuborg123456, who is up $22k year to date. Last year he had similar results. He play a decent amount of $10 On Demand games among others.

Grid3004 said:

Back in the day, SNGs were one of the best formats to build a bankroll. With today’s environment and tougher player pools, do you think Sit’n’Go’s are still worth it, or is it better to just focus on MTTs or cash games?

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SNGs still exist? I thought they went extinct somewhere in the prehistoric dinosaur age.

There isn't as much traffic in Sit & Go's as in previous years; many professional players started out playing in this format. Nowadays, there are more formats, such as Spins or even GGPoker's Battle Royale.

I would probably prefer MTT tournaments. But I think everyone has their own individual factors to consider. If you are serious about the game, your statistics will tell you what is best for you.

I played many micro sngs on stars , I couldn't build a good bankroll to level up stakes . I tried many times but al the time they give me bad beats and crazy results . So nowadays I don't play them , it's been done time since last time . Maybe I will try some more in the future when I LL have some time for thatpurpose .