Poker Hawk Academy

Learn how to run a poker tournament

Step-by-step guides for hosts and players, from building a blind structure to paying out the winner. Start with a guided path or browse by topic.

Guided paths

Run Your First Tournament

The guided path from zero to a finished event — create it, build the blinds, take buy-ins, run the clock, pay out, and crown a winner.

8 lessons →

Switching from The Tournament Director

Moving off legacy desktop software? Map what you know to Poker Hawk, rebuild your favorite structure, and run your first night from your phone.

6 lessons →

Run a Home Game

The lean path for a casual night with friends — quick setup, simple payouts, one screen, done.

10 lessons →

Run a Club Season

Turn your regular crew into a league — a club, recurring games, and a leaderboard that crowns a champion.

8 lessons →

Run a Bar or Charity Tournament

For a bigger, public event — house fees and rake, a top-heavy prize pool, and TVs around the room.

9 lessons →

Player Guide

Everything you need as a player — RSVP, check in, re-enter after a bust, and read the prize pool.

7 lessons →

Browse by topic

Getting Started

First steps to get your account up and running.

What is Poker Hawk?

A tour of what the app does, who it’s for, and how the pieces fit together.

Complete your profile

Add a display name, date of birth, and phone so clubs and tournaments can find you.

Your dashboard explained

The top section, your customizable widgets, and how the dashboard adapts to how you use Poker Hawk.

Customize your mobile dashboard

Mobile guide

Long-press to enter edit mode, then drag, remove, and add widgets to match how you play.

Dashboard Quick Actions

Mobile guide

The Quick Actions row lets you pin one-tap shortcuts to the actions you do most often.

Get to know Poker Hawk

Mobile guide

A quick tour of the mobile app — bottom tabs, Hawk Academy, Settings, and the basics you’ll use every day.

Get to know Poker Hawk

Desktop guide

A quick tour of the desktop app — the sidebar, Hawk Academy, Settings, and the basics you’ll use every day.

Switching from The Tournament Director

Coming from TD? Here’s how Poker Hawk maps to what you know — and where it does more.

Tournament Director → Poker Hawk feature map

A term-by-term translation so you can find everything you used in TD.

What Poker Hawk does differently

The handful of things that change how a night actually runs.

Run your first tournament

The whole flow, start to finish — from creating an event to declaring your winner. Follow along and you’ll have a real tournament on the clock.

Practice with a sandbox

Run a pretend tournament to learn the live screens — nothing counts, and it deletes itself after a day.

Set Up a Tournament

Create an event, build your blinds, and set buy-ins, fees, and the prize pool.

Understanding tournament rake

Percentage vs. flat fees, and how each one changes the prize pool.

Buy-ins, bounties, and where the money goes

How the buy-in splits into prize pool, bounty, and fees when you enable bounties.

Rebuy vs. re-entry — what's the difference?

Late registration strategies

By level, by break, or by minutes — and what each means for your blind structure.

Blind factor and level progression

The multiplier that controls how fast blinds grow. Small tweaks, big impact.

Add-ons and rebuy limits

Windows, caps, and when to use each.

Recreate your blind structure

Rebuild a structure you loved in TD and save it as a reusable template.

Set up your chipset and starting stack

Define your chip denominations and how many of each player starts with.

Set up rebuys and re-entries

Turn on rebuys or re-entries, set the price, and choose when they close.

Set up add-ons

Offer a one-time chip top-up at the break.

Set the late-registration window

Let stragglers enter after the start — and decide exactly when it closes.

Save and reuse tournament presets

Turn a fully configured event into a one-tap starting point.

The pre-launch checklist

What Poker Hawk verifies before you start — and how to clear each warning.

Create a tournament

Name it, set the date and capacity, and choose your registration rules.

Build a blind structure

Start from a template sized to your target length, then adjust levels, antes, and breaks.

Buy-ins, fees & the prize pool

Set what players pay, add an optional membership fee, and watch the live prize pool update.

Guaranteed prize pools

Promise players a minimum prize pool, and how Poker Hawk tops the pool up when entries fall short.

Run the Clock

Start and control the live tournament clock — levels, breaks, and adjustments.

Pausing and adjusting blinds

When to pause, how to adjust, and what not to touch mid-hand.

Calling the clock

The mechanics and the etiquette. Used right, keeps a game flowing.

Handling disputes

A common-sense playbook for the most frequent disagreements.

The live controller, explained

The one screen you run the whole night from, and how it’s organized.

Pause, resume, and add breaks

Stop the clock cleanly and schedule breaks your players can count on.

Run the tournament clock

Start the clock, let blinds advance automatically, and pause or adjust as needed.

Players, Tables & Seating

Check players in, seat them, and balance tables as the field changes.

Running player check-in

The check-in flow from a director's perspective, plus no-show handling.

Seat players and read the seat grid

Assign seats, see every table at a glance, and let players find where they’re sitting.

Balance tables

Keep tables even as players bust — automatically, or with a guided manual move.

Move, swap, or unseat a player

Reseat one player, swap two, or pull someone from the table.

Add and assign dealers

Track dealers per table when you run a dealt game.

Close a table

Break a table down and scatter its players to keep the game tight.

Add players & run check-in

Get players into the event, check them in, and give them a seat and a stack.

Payouts, ICM & Ending

Set the prize distribution, handle deals, and finalize results.

Payout formulas — standard, top-heavy, flat, and custom

What each preset does to your prize distribution, plus a quick ICM primer.

ICM and chops, explained

Why chip counts don’t equal dollars at the final table — and how deals get made.

Run an ICM chop or deal

Split the remaining prize pool fairly when players want to make a deal.

Set the payouts

Choose how the prize pool splits — a preset shape or custom per-place amounts.

End the tournament & finalize results

Confirm the finishing order, verify payouts, and post results to players and history.

Pay the bubble

Give the first player out of the money something back — and what applying a bubble does to your payouts.

Displays, HUD & TV

Show the clock and seating to the room — the audience HUD, TV displays, and casting.

The check-in kiosk — let players check themselves in

A door screen players use to find their name, buy in and take a seat, so you are not the queue.

The audience HUD, explained

The big-screen view your players watch — clock, blinds, prize pool, and seating for the whole room.

Open the audience HUD

Put the clock and seating up on a screen the whole room can see.

Pair a Fire TV or Android TV display

Put the HUD on the big screen with the Poker Hawk TV app and a short pairing code.

Manage multiple displays

Run several screens at once and control what each one shows — the HUD, the full room, or one table.

Clubs & Community

Find, join, and run poker clubs — feeds, leaderboards, members, and recurring games.

Joining a club

Invite code, search, or request to join — three paths into a club.

Creating your own club

Set up a club for your regular game — takes about two minutes.

Managing club members

Roles, permissions, and removing someone who shouldn’t be there.

The club feed, announcements, and polls

Keep your regulars in the loop between games.

Leaderboards and club stats

How your club tracks who’s winning over a season.

Share a club post publicly

Post results or news that friends can open without an account.

Running recurring games with a club

Use a club as your league home — a season of games with a running leaderboard.

Club roles and what they can do

The four roles every new club starts with, how to change what a role can do, and how to give someone a different role.

How people join your club

Decide what happens when people find your club in search, ask them questions first, and review their requests.

Members and players

Why your club’s list has both members and players, and how to merge duplicate records and link a record to someone’s account.

Run a season

Score your club’s tournaments into a league table over dates you choose, then close it to crown a champion.

Playing in Tournaments

For players: RSVP, check in, re-enter after a bust, and read the prize pool.

RSVPing to a tournament

Going / maybe / can't go — what each means for your seat.

Checking into a tournament

What the check-in screen does and how to know your seat.

Re-entering after you bust

When you can come back, what it costs, and how it affects your stack.

Reading the prize pool

Who gets paid, how much, and what "ITM" means.

Tournament tools and cheat sheets

Built-in calculators and reference cards for quick in-game decisions.

Your Profile & Stats

Manage your identity, stats, and badges.

Updating your personal info

Change your name, email, phone, or date of birth.

Understanding your stats

Tournaments played, cashes, ROI — what each metric means and how it’s calculated.

Earning badges

Milestone achievements that show up on your profile card.

Billing & Plans

Player, host, and founder tiers, plan limits, payment, and theme purchases.

Choosing a plan

Basic, Pro, and Elite — what’s included at each tier.

Updating your payment method

Swap cards, change billing address, or fix a declined charge.

Plan tiers and limits

Basic, Pro, and Elite hosting — plus the Founder account benefit.

Manage your subscription

Upgrade, downgrade, pause, or cancel — and when changes take effect.

The Founder Program

Who is a founder, what founders keep, and how the founder era ends.

Buy a premium HUD theme

One-time theme purchases to dress up your audience display.

Settings & Privacy

App preferences, notifications, privacy controls, and account security.

Notification preferences

Choose which events send you a push, email, or SMS.

Privacy — who can see you

Control what other players and clubs can see on your profile.

Manage your sessions and sign out other devices

See where you’re signed in and sign out a device you no longer use.

Block a player

Stop someone from contacting you or appearing in your community.

Delete your account

Permanently remove your account and what that does to your data.

Troubleshooting & FAQ

The most-asked questions and fixes for common snags.