Texas Hold’em is the most popular form of poker played today. In Hold’em, 2 cards are dealt face down to each player (known as a players hole cards), followed by the first round of betting. After the first round of betting is complete, the first 3 community cards are dealt face up (called the flop), followed by the second round of betting. Next, the 4th community card is dealt face up (called the turn or fourth street), followed by the 3rd round of betting. Finally, the 5th community card is dealt face up (called the river or fifth street), followed by the 4th and final round of betting. A player can use any combination of their 2 hole cards and the 5 community cards to create the best possible 5 card hand.

SoundPoker Says: Texas pokeri is easy to get into because it is a relatively simple game to learn. But do not let the ease of learning hide the many complex strategies and techniques found in Texas Hold’em.

Position is very important in Hold’em pokeri. Being the last to act on a hand allows a player to watch and react to what opponents are doing. The dealer is always the last to act in a given round of Hold’em. In order to keep the game fair, the dealer position rotates around the table. In home games, this may be a literal rotation of the dealer, but in casinos a rotating dealer button is used to signify the player who’s position is that of the dealer. The dealer has the advantage of acting last for that round. The dealer button rotates one player clockwise after the end of every round.

Instead of every player paying an ante, the first 2 players to the left of the dealer must post blind bets before the first 2 cards are dealt. They are called blind bets because the player is paying the bets before seeing their cards, hence they are “going in blind”. The first player to the left of the dealer posts the small blind, and the second player to the left of the dealer posts the big blind. In a typical Texas Hold’em game, the big blind is equal to the small bet, and the small blind is about half of the small bet. For example a $10/$20 game would have a big blind of $10 and a small blind of $5. The blinds are used to start the first round of betting. For example, the $10 big blind would be the starting amount players must call to stay in. Keep in mind that if no players raise the starting bet, the blinds do not need to re-pay their bet to stay in. For example, if no player raises the starting bet the big blind would not need to pay anything more to stay in, but the small blind would have to pay their remaining portion of the $10 bet, which in this case would be $5.

Remember, a players hole cards are only as good as the community cards. For example, an A-K is not a very good hand with a board of Q-Q-9-9-J because the cards do not combine into any hand of strength, and the chances of an opponent having a full house of queens or nines is relatively high. Using the flop to gauge the quality of your hand is a good tactic because after the flop a player has seen 5/7 of the playable cards.