The whole table, on one page.

Four things decide most of what happens in a hand: which hand beats which, which hands are worth playing from where you sit, what price a bet is offering you, and how often your draw actually gets there. All four are below, as text and tables rather than a picture, so you can read them at any size. Print the page and you get those four tables alone, together on one sheet of A4.

Everything here is counted rather than copied. The five card totals add up to 2,598,960 and the seven card percentages come from a full enumeration of all 133,784,560 seven card combinations. If you want the reasoning instead of the summary, start at the rules of poker.

1. what beats what

Hand	Five card hands	From seven cards
Royal flush Ten to ace in one suit.	4	1 in 30,940
Straight flush Five in a row, one suit.	36	1 in 3,591
Four of a kind All four of one rank.	624	0.17%
Full house Three of one rank, two of another.	3,744	2.60%
Flush Five of one suit, any order.	5,108	3.03%
Straight Five in a row, any suits.	10,200	4.62%
Three of a kind Three of one rank.	54,912	4.83%
Two pair Two pairs. Highest pair first.	123,552	23.50%
One pair Two of the same rank.	1,098,240	43.82%
High card Nothing. Highest card plays.	1,302,540	17.41%

The third column counts five card hands out of 2,598,960. The fourth is how often seven cards, your two plus the five on the table, end up making that hand as your best. Note the inversion: a full house is rarer than a flush over five cards, 3,744 against 5,108, which is where the ranking comes from. Over seven cards it flips, 2.60 percent against 3.03 percent, and the ranking stays where it is anyway.

Ties are broken card by card, and the last card standing is the kicker. The full ranking with worked examples goes through each of the ten in turn, including the ones that look like a tie and are not. One warning about that order: it holds in almost every poker game, but not in short deck, where a flush beats a full house.

2. what to play, and from where

These are opening ranges for six handed no limit cash: what to raise with when nobody has entered the pot yet. They are a workable starting point for low stakes, not solver output, and there is more than one defensible answer. The percentage is counted from exactly the hands listed next to it, out of the 1,326 possible two card combinations.

Seat	Share	Open with
Early	9.7%	77+, ATs+, KTs+, QTs+, JTs, T9s, AQo+, KQo
Middle	12.5%	66+, A9s+, A5s-A3s, KTs+, QTs+, JTs, T9s, 98s, AJo+, KQo
Cutoff	19.8%	44+, A7s+, A5s-A2s, K9s+, Q9s+, J9s+, T8s+, 97s+, 86s+, 76s, 65s, ATo+, KJo+, QJo
Button	28.5%	22+, A2s+, K6s+, Q8s+, J8s+, T8s+, 97s+, 86s+, 75s+, 65s, 54s, A8o+, KTo+, QTo+, JTo, T9o
Small blind	20.1%	22+, A2s+, K8s+, Q9s+, J9s+, T9s, 98s, 87s, 76s, ATo+, KJo+, QJo

The big blind has no opening range, because by the time it is your turn the pot has already been opened or everyone has folded. What you do there is defend, and that depends on the raise size and who made it.

Reading the notation: s means both cards of the same suit, o means mixed suits, and a plus sign means that hand and every stronger version of it, so ATs+ is ace ten through ace king, all suited. A dash means the run between the two hands named, so A5s-A3s is ace five, ace four and ace three, suited. Why the button plays three times as many hands as early position is a question about position rather than cards, and the Hold'em rules page explains where each seat acts.

Before the flop	Chance	About
Any pocket pair	5.9%	1 in 17
A specific pair, aces for example	0.45%	1 in 221
Ace king, suited or not	1.2%	1 in 83
Ace king suited	0.30%	1 in 332
Two cards of the same suit	23.5%	1 in 4.3
A pair flops a set or better	11.8%	1 in 8.5
Two suited cards flop a flush draw	10.9%	1 in 9.1
Two suited cards flop a made flush	0.84%	1 in 119

3. the price you are being offered

A bet is a price. Divide what you must call by the pot as it will be after you call, and you have the share of the time your hand needs to win for the call to break even. With 100 in the pot and a 50 bet, you call 50 to win 150, so 50 out of 200, which is 25.0 percent.

They bet	You need	Odds
Quarter pot	16.7%	5.0 to 1
Third pot	20.0%	4.0 to 1
Half pot	25.0%	3.0 to 1
Two thirds pot	28.6%	2.5 to 1
Three quarters pot	30.0%	2.3 to 1
Full pot	33.3%	2.0 to 1
One and a half times pot	37.5%	1.7 to 1
Twice the pot	40.0%	1.5 to 1

The other half of the sum is how often you get there. Count your outs, the cards that turn your hand into the winner, and read the row.

Outs	Typical draw	Turn, from the flop	River, from the turn	Both cards, from the flop
2	Pocket pair to a set	4.3%	4.3%	8.4%
4	Gutshot straight draw	8.5%	8.7%	16.5%
6	Two overcards	12.8%	13.0%	24.1%
8	Open ended straight draw	17.0%	17.4%	31.5%
9	Flush draw	19.1%	19.6%	35.0%
12	Flush draw plus a gutshot	25.5%	26.1%	45.0%
15	Flush draw plus an open ender	31.9%	32.6%	54.1%

Three columns, because "one card to come" is not a single number. Turn from the flop is counted off the 47 cards you have not seen after the flop; river from the turn off the 46 that are left by then. Both cards only applies when you see the turn and the river for one price, which in practice means you are all in. Facing a bet on the flop with more betting to come, the first column is your number. Read it together with the price table above: a flush draw against a half pot bet needs 25.0 percent and has 19.1 percent for the turn, so the call only works if the money you expect to win later covers the difference.

4. the mistakes these tables are for

Using the rule of four on every draw

Outs times four is close enough up to about eight outs. Above that it drifts: twelve outs is 45.0 percent and the rule says 48, fifteen outs is 54.1 percent and the rule says 60. The bigger the draw, the more the shortcut flatters it.

Reading a one card number without asking which street

A flush draw is 35.0 percent if you get to see both cards, but that only applies when you see them for one price, which means all in. Facing a bet on the flop with more betting to come, your number is 19.1 percent: the turn from the flop, off the 47 cards you have not seen. On the turn it is 19.6 percent, because only 46 are left. Same draw, three different numbers, and the street decides which one is yours.

Counting outs that are not outs

A card that completes your flush and pairs the board can hand someone a full house. A card that completes your straight can put four to a flush out there. Outs that make you the second best hand cost more than the ones you missed.

Playing the same range from every seat

The table above opens 9.7 percent of hands from early position and 28.5 percent on the button. That gap is not a style preference. It is the number of players who still get to act after you.

Thinking you must use both of your cards

In Hold'em you use any five of the seven. Both, one, or neither. The rule that forces you to use exactly two is the Omaha rule, and applying it to the wrong game is one of the most common mix ups people bring from one table to the other.

Calling to see if you are right

Calling the river to find out costs the same as calling with a plan and teaches you less. Decide before you call which hands you beat. If the answer is none of the ones that would bet, the call was already made for you.

Two of these are really the same mistake in different clothes: trusting a number you did not check. If a different game is what you are sitting down to, the sheet changes with it, and Omaha changes the most, starting with which cards you are allowed to use.

A sheet you can read is not a sheet you know.

The rankings only help if they come to you before the decision does. The trainer shows you hands and asks which one wins, timed, until the answer stops needing a lookup. No account, in the browser.

Try the trainer

cheat sheet questions

What is a poker cheat sheet?

A single reference with the things you need at the table and cannot look up mid hand: which hand beats which, what to open from each seat, and what price a bet is giving you. This page is that reference in text rather than an image, so you can search it, read it on a phone, or print it.

What hands should I play in poker?

From early position, roughly the top ten percent: pairs from sevens up, strong suited aces and broadways, ace queen and king queen. From the button, close to three times as many, because everyone except the blinds has already folded and you act last for the rest of the hand. The full ranges are in the starting hands table above, counted at 9.7 percent early and 28.5 percent on the button.

How do I calculate pot odds?

Divide what you have to call by the pot after your call. A half pot bet into a 100 chip pot means calling 50 to win 150, so 50 divided by 200, which is 25.0 percent. If your hand wins more often than that, calling shows a profit.

What is the rule of 4 and 2?

Multiply your outs by four for the chance of hitting across the turn and river, or by two for the next card alone. It is accurate to within about one point up to eight outs and increasingly optimistic above that. With fifteen outs the rule says 60 percent and the real number is 54.1 percent.

How many outs is a flush draw?

Nine. There are thirteen cards of each suit, you can see four of them, so nine are left. What those nine are worth depends on where you are: 19.1 percent for the turn from the flop, 19.6 percent for the river from the turn, and 35.0 percent if you see both cards for one price.

Can I print this cheat sheet?

Yes, and it fits on one sheet of A4. Printing gives you a different page from the screen: only the four tables you look things up in at the table, in black on white, without the navigation, without the prose around them and without the questions. Nothing is an image, so it stays sharp at any size.

Back to all poker rules, or read the full Texas Hold'em rules behind the numbers on this page.