A satellite is a poker tournament, usually an online poker tournament, in which the winner receives an entry into a larger event. Everyone wants to play in the World Series of Poker, the World Poker Tour, Aruba, or Monte Carlo. Or, maybe you're an online poker player and dream of hitting it big in the Pokerstars million dollar guarantee (held every Sunday.) Poker satellites allow you to achieve those goals on a budget.

Satellites are poker tournaments in which each player pays a smaller buy-in for the chance to earn a seat at those major poker events. Most satellites are multi-table tournaments with smaller buy-ins. These are usually held at online poker rooms, but are sometimes held at brick and mortar casinos.

Here's an example: in a $100 buy-in satellite, the poker room might say something like "1 WSOP Seat will be given away for every 100 participants.". That means that if 900 people enter, the top 9 finishers will get a WSOP seat. Unfortunately, that's only a 1% payout as opposed to the typical 10% payout in normal multi-table tournaments. A less economical, but more realistic, way of winning a seat is through larger buy-in events that cost about $500 to enter. While they're pricier, the payout will usually be upped to about 5% of the field.

A Super Satellite is a multi table satellite that is run for the main event of a tournament. This will allow a fixed number of winners based on the total prize pool. For example, let's say that there is a single-table WSOP satellite. There will be 10 players participating who pay $1,000 each to buy-in to the satellite. Since the total prize pool will be $10,000, one WSOP entry will be given away to the winner of the single-table tournament. The poker room basically arranges this large skill-based raffle of sorts, and takes out its entry fee for organizing the event.

Sometimes, you can find guaranteed overlay satellites which can be a great deal. The poker room might set up a $150 buy-in event and guarantee that 3 WSOP seats will be given away. If only 50 people show up, they still have to give away 3 seats even though they would need 200 people to play to break even on the prize pool. These guaranteed events can give you great odds on your buy-in and allow you to battle a smaller field. To sum up; satellite poker tournaments are an economical way for poker players to earn seats in larger events.

Below is a list of our favorite/recommended online poker sites that offer satellite tournaments on a regular basis. To learn more about each site, simply click on the highlighted text.

Full Tilt has an uber-aggressive satellite program. You can win seats into ANY of their bigger events, including WSOP and WPT events. Tilt is also one of the few sites to offer satellite into prelim events to the WSOP! Their cutting edge software has built in satellite listings: if you click on a major tourney, you'll also get a list of methods to satellite into that event.Click here to visit Full Tilt

Poker Stars Heard of Chris Moneymaker? How about Greg Raymer? Guess how they got their WSOP seats: that right... PokerStars is the undisputed king of online multi-table tournaments. PS runs satellites for EVERYTHING. World Series, World Poker Tour as well as events leading into their big weekly $1,000 prize pool tourney. You'll find 100+ satellites a day offered here. Visit Pokerstars - Click here.

Absolute Poker - has great satellites into many of their guaranteed events. Use your Absolute Points and Satellite into their 100k guar or their nitely $20 Omaha 8/b. AP also offers satellites into World Poker Tour Events, World Series of Poker. Enjoy lower fields and weaker competition... Play at Absolute Poker - Click here.

Ultimate Bet - Runs Satellites all day long. Win your way into their World Poker Tour Aruba event or take a shot at a seat in their big 200K tourney. UB also runs micro tourneys... if you're on a budget, you can play a satellite for as little as a dime! Ultimate Bet also has the best MTT structure on the net. Click here to play @ UB

If / when you win a nice satellite seat to a big poker tournament, be sure to stop by the Shark Poker Forums and share your Poker Success Story with the rest of the Shark Army!