Print out this free poker hand rankings chart – and always know the best winning poker hands. Poker hands are ranked in order from best to worst. Royal Flush An ace high straight flush. Straight Flush Five consecutive cards in the same suit. Four of a Kind Four cards of the same rank. The is the best possible hand you can get in standard five-card Poker is called a royal. If you have no pair, three of a kind, straight, flush, full house, etc., then the highest card in your hand is considered to be decisive. The hand above, in which the best card is a king and there is no other combination of poker hand, is known as 'king-high'. Ace high beats king. The simplest definition of a bad beat is when a poker hand that is a favorite to win, loses to an underdog hand that catches up and beats it. Let's say for example, in a typical no-limit hold'em game or no-limit hold'em tournament, you go all-in before the flop with the best possible hand at that moment: Ace, Ace. Some players, especially at the lower levels, play any ace or any hand with an ace and any card the same suit as the ace. At lower levels you'll often see hands where a player with an ace and a small off card hit two pair and beat a hand with a pair of aces and a large second hole card that doesn't pair up.
Winning poker hands
If you are new to poker, you will initially strain to understand the poker hand rankings. However, you can easily understand the rankings if you spend some time familiarising yourself how the hands are made. In simple terms, a poker game has 10 possible hands that participants can make. These hands are categorised from the strongest to the weakest, where the Royal Flush is the strongest hand while the 'High card' is the weakest hand.
Which poker hand beats what?
When you have made 3-of-a-kind (often called a set), you will most probably win the pot. To beat 3-of-a-kind you need to have a minimum of one straight. A set of 5 sequential cards in which one of the cards is from a distinct match is known as a 'Straight.' If you have a 7-high straight, you will win the game.
When cards run from an ace to a five, the set is called a 'Wheel,' and when they run from a ten to an ace, the set is called 'Broadway straight.' A Flush is among the strongest hands in Texas Holdem since it beats most hands and is beaten by a few hands. When a hand has 5 cards of a similar suit, it is called a 'Flush.' Some hands that can defeat a flush include a full house (also called a 'boat') which comprises five cards made up of 3-of-a-kind and a pair. The highest three-of-a-kind dictates the hand that prevails in case of full houses; hence, 'Kings Full' will defeat 'Fives Full.'
Stronger hands
The strongest hand in the poker game hands ranking is the 'Royal Flush.' Getting this hand is extremely rare; therefore, you need to be very lucky to have a 'Royal Flush.' Most players who have played for years can confess that they have never had this hand. This hand consists of a 10, J, A, Q, and K from a similar suit. When you have a Royal Flush, you are assured of winning apart from when the Royal Flush is on the board in which case it will be a split pot.
Weaker hands
Such hands appear more compared to strong hands, however, you should not automatically regard them as weak; simply focus on the table and the potential combinations. A good example of a weaker hand is a 'Straight' which comprises 5-sequential cards. With a 'Straight' set, an Ace can be used as the most powerful or the least powerful card.
Even if you play poker at your local bar or you enjoy the virtual game, you need to understand poker hands rankings. Understanding the appropriate ranking of poker hands is crucial to making poker hands that win.
There are 169 different starting hands you can be dealt in Texas Hold'em. Pocket Aces are clearly the best, but what are the worst possible hands in poker? Let's take a look.
Worst Texas Hold'Em Hole Cards Explained
How do you work out the worst possible starting hand in poker?
Of course, some hands are harder than others to play preflop. Then, some people just hate certain hands because of bad beats they've experienced. But how can you decide which poker hands are objectively the worst?
Poker equity is defined as the percentage of the time your hand will win the pot at showdown after all the community cards are dealt.
The most common way to rank starting hands is to use a poker equity calculator such as PokerCruncher or Flopzilla. This the basis for most hand ranking lists, including the one below.
Equity calculators run millions of simulations to work out how many times a certain hand beats another hand. For example, if you input AA v KK, the calculator would deal all five community cards millions of times and count how many times each starting hand wins. In this example AA wins about 82% of the time, so you can say AA's preflop equity against KK is 82%. At least, when they are heads-up against each other.
You can also run the simulations against random cards. That way, you can see how that particular starting hand fares against all the other possible starting hands.
A hand like pocket aces (e.g., A♣A♥, A♠A♦) obviously has very good equity against every other hand. It is the best hole hand in poker, after all. It will win around 85% of the time versus one random starting hand.
However, usually, when people are ranking starting hands they don't do it heads-up. They do it for a full ring of players, usually with 9 or 10 players. Doing this for AA we can see that it wins against 8 random hands 35% of the time. That's pretty good considering an equal share would be 11%.
To make a list of worst poker starting hands, you do the same thing – but with trash hands.
There are a few problems with this method… It's not very realistic, after all. When was the last time you got it all-in against 8 players, let alone without them caring about what cards they have? Only a complete maniac would push 7♥2♣ all-in!
But it's still a good starting point. Let's take a look at what comes out as the worst Texas Hold'em hands.
List of the Worst Poker Hole Hands
Here is our list of the worst hole cards in Texas Hold'em, ranked on their equity against random cards, full-ring and heads-up.
7-2 Offsuit
Hmmm, 7 2 offsuit – the W.H.I.P (worst hand in poker). A hand that is so bad that it inspired the 2-7 poker variant, where players have a side-bet on whether they can win a pot with it.
Against 8 opponents holding random cards, 72o will win about 5.4% of the time. Remember that 11.1% is the equal share and AA's equity is 35%!
Heads-up against any two cards (ATC), it wins around 34.6% of the time, which is actually better than a hand like 32o fares. But still pretty bad, considering 50% is the equal share and AA comes out at 85%.
Why is 72o so bad? You can't make a flush, you can't make a straight and if you do make a pair of twos or sevens the chance of an overcard on the board is pretty much 100%!
The best things about 72o are that it's easy to fold – and nobody will ever suspect you're crazy enough to play it.
8-2 Offsuit
With 8 and 2 offsuit, you have all the problems of 72o, but with 8 high instead of 7 high.
This translates to a 5.6% winning percentage against 8 random hands. Heads-up is a similar story: a pitiful 36.9% equity against any two cards.
It's better than 72o – but not by much. Just fold it and move on with your life.
8-3 Offsuit
83o has the same problems as 82o except you might make a pair of threes instead of a pair of twos. Not a massive improvement, and that's reflected in its equity calculator results.
83o has about 5.8% equity versus 8 random hands, and 37.5% heads-up.
Fold it!
6-2 Offsuit
Yes, 62o can make a straight. But making a straight is very hard in Texas Hold'em – especially when you need three specific cards to come.
Against 8 players holding random cards, 62o wins around 6% of the time. If you are heads-up, it's 34.1% versus any two cards.
3-2 Offsuit
32o is statistically the worst hand in a heads-up situation against any two cards, winning only around 32% of the time.
Against 72o (the so-called worst hand in poker), 32o loses 65% of the time!
32o fares better all-in against 8 other players holding random cards than the other cards on the list, winning around 6.1% of the time.
Which Hands Beat What In Poker Terms
But it is still one of the worst poker hole hands you can be dealt, and you should be folding it almost every time.
Other Bad Poker Hands
The traditional method of running simulations against 8 people holding any two cards is a very rough-and-ready way of ranking hole cards.
In practice, you'll find the worst poker hand isn't the two hole cards that lose an imaginary all-in situation against random cards.
A bad poker hand is any hand that causes you to lose more money than you should. These are known as 'Trouble Hands'. They are hands where you rarely know where you are at and cause you to lose a lot of money if you are not careful. These hands can ruin a calling station or unhinged loose player.
Usually this happens when you don't realize you have the second-best hand. That's why there's a saying: 'The worst hand in poker is the second-best hand.'
You won't get into trouble with trash hands like 72o because you won't play them very often, and if you do you will know where you are on the flop – either you flop something amazing or you still have complete trash. There's not really any in-between. The strategies for a bad poker hand are very straightforward!
72o won't be in many players top ten least profitable hands, because they just won't get into big pots with it. It's easy to get away from, even if you do see a flop.
Which Hands Beat What In Poker Machine
But a hand like KJo can look pretty good, even if someone has raised from early position. KJo is what's known as a dominated hand. If you hit top pair, but your opponent has a better kicker, you have the second-best hand and you are going to lose money.
And when they don't have the better kicker, you might worry that they do and end up folding the better hand!
With a dominated hand, you never really know where you are at. Even when you do have the best hand, you just can't stand any pressure.
Finally – and this might sound stupid, but bear with us – sometimes big pocket pairs can be the worst hole cards to have.
This is because they can be really hard to fold, even when the board and your opponent's actions are screaming at you that you are beat. This means you can lose a lot of money – something that just won't happen with trash hands. With big pocket pairs you can feel entitled to win – and that's a recipe for disaster!
Nobody likes folding pocket Aces – but at the end of the day, they are just a pair. Hand strength in poker is always relative. Aces are the best pre-flop hand, but after the flop, everything can change. Just don't ever fold them pre-flop!
That's why starting hand rankings are a useful starting point but not the be-all and end-all. Poker is not a game where you can just memorize a bunch of charts and do well. You have to play the board and your opponents if you want to be a winner.
Which Hands Beat What In Poker
When people talk about the worst possible hand in poker they are often referring to the starting hands that do worst in equity simulations against random cards. But you are unlikely to lose much money with these trash hands – it's the Trouble Hands that you need to watch out for!
