About All In Central
All In Central is built by a poker enthusiast, for poker enthusiasts. I'm no professional — just a happy amateur who loves nothing better than a long poker night with friends. I could never find one place that pulled together everything a home game actually needs, so I built it.
The heart of it is a clean, big-screen poker timer that runs your blinds, payouts and average stack — the kind you can prop on the TV and forget about. Around it sit plain-English rules and hand rankings, free calculators for blinds, chips and payouts, and step-by-step hosting guides.
Four friends and a phone in your pocket
You don't need a laptop, a spreadsheet or an app-store account. Four of you round a kitchen table, a corner of the pub, a cabin with dodgy wifi — pull out your phone, open the timer in the browser, and the whole tournament lives in your pocket. Blind levels tick up on their own, the average stack and players-left update as people bust, and there's nothing between you and the first hand. Prop it against a beer glass where everyone can see it, hit start and deal.
The blinds run while the miles do
A long train ride or a road trip is the best place I know to kill a few hours with cards. Deal on the fold-down table, start the timer, and let the rising blinds make the time vanish. The countdown is timestamp-based, so it keeps proper time even when the screen sleeps or the tab drops into the background — lock your phone between levels, take a nap, and it never drifts. Come back an hour later and it's exactly where it should be.
Poker night, cast to the big screen
This is the classic: someone's flat or house, a proper table, friends who take it just seriously enough. Open the timer on a laptop, hit fullscreen and cast it to the TV — now the blinds, the countdown and the payouts are big enough to read from the sofa across the room, and the screen stays awake all night. Nobody has to lean in and squint, or keep asking what level it is. If you're hosting your first one, my home poker tournament guide walks through buy-ins, stacks and structure.
A proper private tournament, tables and all
Sometimes it grows: a bigger field, more than one table, a private tournament that deserves to be run like the real thing. The timer scales up with rebuys, add-ons, scheduled breaks and automatic, top-heavy payouts across anywhere from 1 to 50 paid places — turn on rebuys and add-ons and they feed straight into the prize pool and average stack. Set the buy-in and it works out the pot; the payout, blind-structure and chip-distribution calculators handle the rest before anyone sits down.
The regular crew, first Friday of the month
Some groups make it a ritual — the same faces, the same table, a standing date. Your setup is saved in your browser, so the structure, buy-in and payouts you dialled in last time are ready the next time you open the timer. Tweak whatever's changed, hit start, and the night runs itself.
Everything in one place
The timer is the centre of it, but the rest is there so you never have to open a second tab mid-hand. The Texas Hold'em rules and hand rankings settle the table arguments, the calculators sort blinds, chips and payouts before you start, and there's a beginner guide, a glossary and an FAQ for the questions that always come up. It's all free, and it all lives here.
Keeping it free
All In Central is free to use, and I want to keep it that way. The site is supported by relevant advertising and the occasional affiliate link — for things like cards, chips and poker gear — which never sways what's recommended here.
Built by someone who just wanted a better poker night. If it makes yours run smoother, that's the whole point.