The odds of being dealt with any specific pocket pair when playing against a single player, such as aces, is 220:1, with the odds of someone else being dealt pocket kings being significantly lower at 205:1. When playing against nine other opponents, the odds become around 21.8:1, or 1 in 22.8. The likeliest hand to crack pocket aces is 10-9 suited, but the aces will still win 77% of the time. Play your aces just guarded enough against possible sets and flops that make 'ace-cracker' hands work, but most of the time, following up with a sizeable post-flop bet is again the odds-on play. The likeliest hand to crack pocket aces is 10-9 suited, but the aces will still win 77% of the time. Play your aces just guarded enough against possible sets and flops that make 'ace-cracker' hands work, but most of the time, following up with a sizeable post-flop bet is again the odds-on play.
Want to find out the probabilities of being dealt an ace before the flop in Texas Hold'em? Use the tables below to help you find the different aces odds based on the situation and the number of players at the table.
Aces probabilities odds charts.
# Players | % Odds |
---|---|
2 | 18% |
3 | 40% |
4 | 50% |
5 | 59% |
6 | 66% |
7 | 73% |
8 | 78% |
9 | 83% |
# Players | % Odds |
---|---|
2 | 12% |
3 | 23% |
4 | 32% |
5 | 41% |
6 | 50% |
7 | 57% |
8 | 64% |
9 | 69% |
# Players | % Odds |
---|---|
2 | 16% |
3 | 29% |
4 | 41% |
5 | 51% |
6 | 60% |
7 | 68% |
8 | 74% |
9 | 80% |
Probability of being dealt an ace in any Texas Hold'em game is 15%.
How to use aces odds.
These tables are not going to be of much use to you whilst you play, but it is useful information on the probabilities of hands with aces turning up at your table.
The most useful information from these aces odds tables is that the likelihood of a player being dealt an ace increases with the number of players at the table.
The likelihood of another player holding an ace if you hold an ace yourself table (top right) is interesting. There is a fairly high probability that another player at a 9-seater table holds an ace if you do as well. This means that we should be cautious when dealt weak aces and should fold them in early position. There is a chance that we were the only player at the table holding an ace, but we are saving ourselves more money in the long run for when we come up against another player with a better ace than ours.
Playing aces in Texas Hold'em.
An ace is the highest ranking card in Texas Hold'em and can be played either high or low. This means that if you are dealt an ace preflop, there is a fair chance that you hold one of the strongest hands at the table. If you are all-in with an opponent and they do not have a pocket pair or a better ace, you are the favorite to win the hand.
However, you should be careful to not become overly attached to the hand when you are dealt an Ace, because there is a fair chance that you will lose a sizeable proportion of your stack if you get into a hand with another player that holds a better ace than you (e.g. A9 vs AQ).
Be careful to not overvalue hands with aces, as they can get you in to a lot of trouble if you do not have a good kicker.
For strategy guides on how to play hands with aces, take a look at the rag aces and pocket aces articles.
Texas hold'em starting hands ranked. Go back to the poker odds charts.
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Odds Of Getting Pocket Aces Twice
Comments
Those Pesky Aces Got you Blue?
There's a question for the ages, in poker terms. The short answer is 'Hah!' but the longer and more careful answer is, 'It depends on the game and conditions.'
Slow-playing a pair of pocket aces, particularly under the gun, is often an invitation to trouble, and as you grow in experience at the game, you will invariably run up against a player who never limps under the gun, always raising if he's going to play – except in the rare case he has pocket aces. The idea, of course, is that he wants someone to raise from late position, so he can come back over the top with a hefty three-bet in an attempt to get lots of chips into the pot before the flop.
Once you encounter this particular breed of player and see this trait, you'll be able to limp behind with pocket queens, toss them away if other action compels you to, and toss them away for cheap after the flop if you don't connect for the set. The lesson: Don't be that type of player, and make your pocket aces so obvious by your position bets.
That said, there are some general rules you can adhere to if that 1-in-229-hand occurrence comes up, and you find yourself staring down at pocket rockets. The general rule is to play them a little bit faster then you might otherwise believe. It's easy to lose a lot of money with aces, perhaps even easier than it is to win a lot of money with them. So with that in mind:
First Rule, Don't Limp
Don't limp with your aces if you are at a soft, passive (often lower-stakes) table that often sees four or five or six players seeing a cheap flop. Pocket aces play very poorly against a large number of competing hands, and even though they're a prohibitive favorite against any other single hand, they can often be a large dog against a collection of other hands. Don't forget it's the trash that connects to the flop that stays around and plays; the trash that misses folds and disappears from the hand. Coordinated flops like 9-10-J are absolute death for pocket aces in a multi-way pot. Throw them away and lick your wounds quietly.
Don't Always 3 Bet
Conversely, don't always make the automatic three-bet in poker with pocket aces before the flop. When holding pocket aces, you want to limit the field, not destroy it. If there's a healthy raise pre-flop by an aggressive player, and your image is loose, go ahead and make the three-bet raise and mix it up at will. But another ploy that works well against tighter, more cautious players is called 'second-hand low'. This is when an early-position player makes a healthy opening raise – perhaps $12 or $15 in a $1/2 cash game, and you just smooth-call from middle position. This gives a late-position player or one of the blinds the opportunity to look at a half-good hand like A-K and make a three-bet squeeze raise, which should have you dancing in your seat. Don't do this too often or become too devoted to other subtle tricks, lest you succumb to 'fancy play syndrome', but the occasional subterfuge will improve your game and profit margin.
About the Pot Odds
Poker Hand Odds Calculator
Use your pocket aces to deny proper pot odds to your opponents. Whether in cash games or tournaments, a situation often arises where you can size your bets in such a way as to ensure a single opponent does not have the proper odds to continue in the hand, even though he may think he does. Imagine a cash-game scenario, playing something as simple as $1/2, where you and your opponent in a hand both have $120 in chips. He opens to perhaps $10, and you, holding pocket aces here, can go ahead and put in an undersized reraise to perhaps $25 to induce the call. While he is rightly guessing that his $15 call is worth it when there's $38 or more in the pot and your remaining $95 to potentially still be won, you have the knowledge that your aces are between 3.6:1 and 6:1 favorites heads-up before the flop against any other hand.
The likeliest hand to crack pocket aces is 10-9 suited, but the aces will still win 77% of the time. Play your aces just guarded enough against possible sets and flops that make 'ace-cracker' hands work, but most of the time, following up with a sizeable post-flop bet is again the odds-on play. Often, your opponent will flop a flush or straight draw, and you must make it unprofitable for him to pursue that draw – even though many players can't resist the temptation and will call against the odds anyway. These players are your long-term victims, even if they are paradoxically the ones most likely to crack your aces in any given hand. Such is the nature of poker. We always remember the aces we lose with, but rarely the ones we win with!
Aces and Drawing Hands, The Crackers
Beware drawing hands in deep-stack situations. A corollary to the above. No matter how pretty your pocket aces look, pocket aces don't beat straights and flushes. You must drive drawing hands out of the hand, and the only way to do that is to protect your aces with a large bet. Pre-flop that means limiting the field; post-flop that means putting in raises of at least three-quarters of the pot on each round to make sure your opponent doesn't have the right pot odds to chase those eight- and nine-outers.
Hitting a Set of Aces
If you've flopped a set of aces, there is always a potential straight draw. This might sound odd, but a set of kings is often a far safer hand to slow-play after the flop than is a set of aces. Imagine yourself with a pair of pocket aces, and envision a flop of any three non-paired cards that include an ace. Online casino real money no deposit bonus. No matter what the other two non-ace cards are, if you let your opponents see the turn for free, a turn card that doesn't pair the board will always put some sort of straight in play. It might be a highly unlikely holding, such as the big blind holding 4-7 and the board through the turn showing A-5-J-8, but if you've let this player see all these cards for free and a 6 comes off on the river (roughly a 1-in-11 chance), you've only yourself to blame. You have to charge them something for the dream of making that hand.
No worthy bad beat story ever started with, 'I limped with pocket aces….' Enough said.
Odds Of Pocket Aces In Holdem
Author:Joseph Falchetti (twitter)
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