Preflop
Preflop is the first betting round, played after the hole cards are dealt and before any community card appears.
It is the round with the least information and the most influence on everything that follows. The hands you enter with and the seat you enter from decide the range you will be playing on every later street, and no clever postflop play repairs a bad starting range.
It is also the round that repeats most reliably, which is why it rewards a plan. The same decisions come up every orbit from the same seats, so improvements here are earned once and collected every session.
an example
your cards
You are dealt ace king suited, one of the 4 combinations of that hand among the 1,326 possible starting hands. Nothing about the board is known yet, and the only decisions available are fold, call and raise.
This example is made up. The real one is in your own hand history: find preflop in your own hands and see how often it came up and what it cost you.
related terms
Open raise
An open raise is the first voluntary raise of a hand, made when everyone before you has folded and nobody has yet put mo ...
Flop
The flop is the first three community cards, dealt face up all at once after the first round of betting in Texas Hold'em ...
Hole cards
Your hole cards are the two cards dealt face down to you alone, which only you may use and which stay hidden until a sho ...
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Knowing the word is not the same as seeing it.
The full order of play, from the blinds to the showdown.