Filters: zoom in on what matters
Period, buy-in, room, game type: the filters that actually matter to zoom in on what counts.
Gandalf
Co-founder of Poker Sciences
So far, we've been reading the curves on your full sample. Filters let you zoom in: keep only the games you care about (your current stake, a room, a time period) and read the curves on that subset.
The two panels don't have the same filters. The Chips tab has more, because the curve is read per hand. The Bankroll and Stats tabs are read per tournament: some filters don't make sense there.
1. Filters shared across all tabs
Four filters are available on all three tabs of the Dashboard (Chips, Bankroll, Stats):
| Filter | Values | What it's for |
|---|---|---|
| Period | • Today • Yesterday • This week • This month • This year • All time • Custom range | Look only at a specific interval: a result for the week, the month, or starting from a given date. |
| Buy-in | One or several buy-ins ticked | The most useful filter: only compare comparable stakes. |
| Game type | • Classic • Nitro • Flash • Spin Gold • PokerStars | Isolate one game type. |
| Room | • Winamax • Betclic • PokerStars • GGPoker • Others | Read your results on a specific room when you play across several. |
Why does PokerStars also appear in the game types? That's normal: on PokerStars, Spins have a specific structure. The higher the multiplier, the larger the starting stack. The tracker therefore classifies them as a game type of their own, not just as a room.
A reminder about the buy-in filter: mixing €2 and €25 doesn't really make sense. Not the same opponents, not the same expected CEV, not the same variance, not the same hourly earnings.
With no filter at all, you still get useful global data (for example: how much you've won in euros in total). But as soon as you move into a finer analysis (CEV, CEV by position, €/h, etc.), a sample mixing several stakes skews the reading (see The 4 KPIs).
2. The Chips tab's specific filters
Three additional filters exist on the Chips tab, because the curve is read per hand:
- Position: HU SB/BB, 3-max BU/SB/BB
- Effective stack: keep only the hands played within a certain bb range
- Phase: preflop alone or postflop alone
To be taken as an indicator only. These filters show how your chips evolve in a specific context, but the CEV they produce isn't really interpretable, let alone comparable to another player's.
This can be surprising: many players use these filters to analyze their game ("my preflop CEV", "my BB 3-max CEV"). And yet it's almost always misleading. Here's why.
The usual CEV is measured on a whole Spin type (a buy-in, a format, a room). The Position, Stack and Phase filters measure it on a slice of the tournament: preflop alone, BB 3-max alone, or a stack range. These aren't the same numbers, and there is no external reference to judge them against.
Only the total really counts: you can have −100 in postflop CEV offset by +500 in preflop and everything's fine. To go further (see CEV: traps to avoid), you need a different tool from the filters: the Leak Finder, which you'll see in the following modules.
3. Filter just enough
Filtering means trading off between precision and amount of data: the more you narrow the sample, the more reliable the numbers are, but if it gets too small, you can't conclude anything anymore. The right balance depends mostly on one thing: the data you're looking at.
CEV (Chips tab): the most demanding trade-off.
CEV only makes sense on a single stake: mixing €2 and €25 skews the reading (see The 4 KPIs). And you need lots of hands for it to stabilize.
So a buy-in filter is almost always essential.
Good news: most players already play on a single stake at the same room, so a simple buy-in filter is enough.
Bankroll (€ profit): no filter is required.
You're looking at an amount that adds up without bias between stakes: €100 won at €2 + €200 won at €25 really do make €300 of profit. You can read the curve with no filter at all.
Feel free to add one based on what you want to see: period ("how much I won this month"), room ("how much on Winamax"), or even buy-in if you want to isolate your gains at a specific stake.
Stats: in between.
Most numbers in this tab depend on the buy-in. Mixing stakes blurs the reading, just like for CEV. You can still do it if you know what you're reading (for example, to compare your overall activity between two months), but filtering by buy-in remains the default rule.
Yes, yes, filter by stake, that's it. Hold on, I'm reading, I just got an important letter.
They say they've found The Book of the Game, in the North...
Key takeaways
Filters serve to zoom in on a subset of your sample. The more you narrow, the more precision you gain, but the less data you have left.
• Four main filters across the three Dashboard tabs: period, buy-in, game type, room.
• On the Chips tab, three more: position, stack, phase. Useful to explore, but their CEV is to be taken as an indicator only.
• The most reliable approach remains to put volume on one stake, at the same room.
