From Fixed Limit to No Limit

What the pros and cons of no limit compared to fixed limit?

In no limit you have more flexibility since the bet amount is not fixed. You can make bigger value bets, protect your hand against draws, and pull off big bluffs, and more. Whether these changes are to your liking is a question of taste. Your opponents, of course, have the same freedoms

Is the profit bigger for fixed limit or no limit Hold'em?

For the same financial risk, a strong player will make about as much at either variant, on the average.

To compare fixed limit and no limit, multiply the big blind of a no limit game by 3 and you will have the profit equivalent fixed limit game big blind.

Should I switch?

I cannot give a general answer here. This is something you must answer for yourself. The most important, if not the only, criterion should be whatever you have more fun doing. If you have more fun at no limit, then switch. If not, don't.

Here are a few very important points that you should pay attention to as a switcher:

The bet size is oriented by the size of the pot, not the blinds.

In fixed limit the bet sizes are always in small or big bets. In no limit everything is relative to the size of the pot. Common bet sizes are, for example, ½ pot, 2/3 pot, or 1 pot depending on the situation.

Pot odds are always freely determinable.

In fixed limit it is usually not possible to gain effective protection from draws. With a strong draw (8 outs or more) your opponent will practically always get the right pot odds for a call. But in no limit it's possible to explicitly give your opponent bad pot odds so that he will make mistakes.

The size of your stack matters.

In fixed limit the gain you can make per round is strictly limited. In no limit there is only the effective limit of your stack. A complete strategy must accommodate this. You play differently with a stack of 20 BB than with a stack of 100 BB.

Position means a lot more.

Position is very important in fixed limit games, but it becomes even more so in no limit. You have several advantages from position . The most important is control of the pot size. Depending on what your hand is, you can keep the pot small or make it big.

Implied odds are more important than pot odds.

If you don't have the pot odds for a draw in fixed limit, you usually fold. It's different in no limit. Even if you the pot odds are worse than the odds, you can often call draws anyway. The word here is implied odds. The amount you can win on the unplayed streets is not limited (except by stack size)

TPTK is not a hand that you always want to take to the showdown.

You would almost always see the showdown in fixed limit with this kind of hand. In no limit these hands tend to either win small pots or to lose big. The decisive question is „Will my opponent risk his entire stack with a hand weaker than mine?" And often with TPTK the answer is no.

Betting becomes more important on the later streets.

In no limit Hold'em the bet size is strongly connected to the pot size. Since the pot size increases from street to street, bets at the end are substantially larger than bets in the beginning. A wrong call on the flop will probably cost 5 big blinds, whereas a wrong call on the river might cost 35.