Poker Rules

Learn how to play Poker

The aim of poker is to make the highest possible hand using five cards. Each person will try to beat the other by making a higher hand. You view a list of hand rankings here.

There are various forms of poker with the most commonly played being Texas Hold ‘em, Omaha and Seven card Stud.

Texas Hold ‘em Basics

Hold 'em is a blind bet game, usually in the form of a small blind (half bet) and a big blind (full bet). These two compulsory bets must be placed by the two players to the immediate left of the dealer. The dealer position moves left at the end of each hand. A small disk called a "button" is used to indicate this position. See figure 1.

Figure 1:

To start a hand the blinds are posted and then each player is dealt two cards face down, one at a time. These are known as players 'hole cards'. Then the first round of betting commences on the strength of these two cards. The first player to act is the player after the big blind. This player can call, bet or fold. In other betting rounds you will also have the option to check.

After the first round of betting community cards are dealt face up in the center of the table, these are to be shared by all players. The cards are dealt in the following sequence:

• Flop (First 3 cards) - Then follows another round of betting
• Turn Card (4th card) - Then follows another round of betting
• River Card (5th card) - Then follows the last round of betting (see fig 2)

Figure 2:

After all the betting rounds have taken place, we have the showdown to determine which player has the best hand and wins the pot. There are three different kinds of betting game in Hold 'em. First limit, which has a fixed betting increment and can only increase at this rate. Second pot limit, which means you can bet up to a maximum of everything in the pot already. Lastly no limit which is exactly what it says, you can bet what you like.