Section 1: Introduction
Texas hold'em is the most widely played form of poker. Each player receives two private cards and shares five community cards dealt face up in the middle; the best five-card hand wins the pot — or the last player left after everyone else folds does.
Why this is a community entry. Poker has major tournaments and long-settled cardroom conventions, but no single sanctioning body issues its rules the way FIDE does for chess. House rules genuinely differ between rooms, so this describes standard practice rather than a governed law.
Section 2: The Deck
- One standard 52-card deck, no jokers.
- Cards rank ace high down to two. The ace also plays low in a 5-4-3-2-A straight.
- No suit outranks another — suits never break a tie in hold'em.
- Chips for betting, and a dealer button marking position, which moves one seat clockwise each hand.
Section 3: Setup & Deal
- The two players left of the button post forced bets: the small blind and the big blind.
- Each player is dealt two private cards ("hole cards") face down.
- The first betting round begins with the player to the left of the big blind.
Section 4: Gameplay
The Four Betting Rounds
- Pre-flop: after the hole cards are dealt.
- The flop: three community cards dealt face up, then betting.
- The turn: a fourth community card, then betting.
- The river: a fifth community card, then a final round.
Actions
- Check: pass, only when no bet is outstanding.
- Bet / raise: put chips in, or increase an existing bet.
- Call: match the current bet.
- Fold: surrender the hand and any chips already committed.
In no-limit hold'em a player may bet their entire stack at any point. A player who cannot cover a bet may go all-in and remains eligible for the portion of the pot they matched; further betting forms a side pot.
Making a Hand
Your hand is the best five cards from your two hole cards plus the five community cards. You may use both, one, or neither — playing the board is legal, and when the board is the best hand available the pot is split.
Section 5: Scoring & Winning
There are no points. Hands rank, highest first:
- Royal flush — A-K-Q-J-10, one suit
- Straight flush — five in sequence, one suit
- Four of a kind
- Full house — three of a kind plus a pair
- Flush — five of one suit
- Straight — five in sequence, mixed suits
- Three of a kind
- Two pair
- One pair
- High card
At showdown the best hand takes the pot. Identical hands split it — suits never break the tie.
Section 6: Variants & House Rules
- Limit hold'em: bet sizes are fixed, with a cap on raises per round.
- Pot-limit: the maximum bet is the current size of the pot.
- Omaha: four hole cards, and you must use exactly two of them.
- Short-deck (six-plus): twos through fives removed, which reorders some hand rankings — a flush beats a full house.
- Tournament vs cash: tournaments use rising blinds and chips with no cash value; cash games use fixed blinds and chips you can walk away with.
