Texas Hold’em Texas Hold'em
A poker game where you make the best 5-card hand from 2 hole cards and 5 community cards. Players compete against each other and the casino takes a cut of the pot as a fee, so unlike other casino games, there is no fixed house edge.
| English | Texas Hold'em |
|---|---|
| Classification | Basics & Betting Terms |
| Category | Poker (player vs. player) |
| Cards | 1 deck of 52 cards |
| Hole cards | 2 cards (hole cards) |
| Community cards | 5 cards (flop 3, turn 1, river 1) |
| Betting rounds | 4 (preflop, flop, turn, river) |
| Starting hand combinations | 1,326 (effectively 169) |
| Birthplace | Robstown, Texas (recognized by the Texas Legislature) |
Overview
Texas Hold’em is a poker game where each player combines their 2 hole cards with 5 community cards dealt face up in the middle of the table, and whoever makes the strongest 5-card hand takes the pot. It is the most widely played style of poker today.
Unlike baccarat or roulette, your opponents are not the casino but other players. That means the game itself has no house edge, and the casino earns money by taking a cut of the pot or a time fee as a commission (the rake).
How a Hand Plays Out
| Step | Cards | Details |
|---|---|---|
| Blinds | – | The two players to the dealer’s left post forced bets (the small and big blinds). The small blind is usually half the big blind. |
| Preflop | 2 hole cards | The first betting round. |
| Flop | 3 community cards | The second betting round. |
| Turn | 1 community card | The third betting round. |
| River | 1 community card | After the last betting round, the remaining players reveal their hands (the showdown). |
In each round you choose to check, call, raise, or fold. If everyone else folds, the last player left takes the pot without showing their hand. If hands are equal, the pot is split. There are 1,326 possible starting hands, but when you group them by suit, there are effectively 169.
Three Betting Structures
- Limit: Bet and raise amounts are fixed. Preflop and the flop use the size of the big blind, and the turn and river use double that.
- No-limit: As long as you make at least the minimum raise, you can bet up to all of your chips (all-in).
- Pot-limit: The maximum raise is capped at the current size of the pot.
History
| Period | Details |
|---|---|
| Early 1900s | Said to have started in Robstown, Texas. The Texas Legislature recognized it as the birthplace in a 2007 resolution. |
| 1963 | First introduced at the California Club in Las Vegas. |
| 1970 | The Binion family started the World Series of Poker (WSOP), and the Main Event was later set as no-limit hold’em. |
| 2003 | An amateur who qualified online won the WSOP Main Event, sparking a boom in hold’em and online poker. |
There are also variants where the casino plays against you. The Wizard of Odds calculated the house edge of “Ultimate Texas Hold’em” at 2.19% based on the ante bet. In poker, short-term results swing a lot even when there is a skill gap, so it helps to also understand the concepts of variance and standard deviation.