Top 10 Starting Hands In No Limit Poker

• The cards listed above in the starting hands selection section can be played from almost any position, but you should try and tighten up your starting hand selection in the earlier positions. So as a general rule, you can play with a wider range of the top starting hands in later positions than you should in the earlier positions in the hand.
• In this video, I show you some of the best starting hands in poker. If you are playing No Limit Texas Hold'em, you need to know the importance of your starting hand. A good starting hand will.
• In his famous Super / System, universally regarded as the bible of poker strategy books, poker legend Doyle Brunson devoted the third chapter to his list of 10 trouble hands – or starting hands that should only be played in certain situations if at all. And Ace Queen was at the top of that list for Texas Dolly.

• Top 10 Starting Hands In No Limit Poker Bonus
• Top 10 Starting Hands In No Limit Poker Rules
• Top 10 Starting Hands In No Limit Poker Tournaments

Top Global Poker Rooms. The Study of Tactics in Poker; Beating 6 Max No Limit Holdem by Sauce123. Below is a table of Texas Holdem starting hands.

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No Limit Holdem Starting Hands

Starting hands are the most important thing you’ll need to learn in poker. These are the type of hands that you should consider playing pre-flop and a lot of factors should help make these decision. Things such as your table position, stack sizes and table image are extremely important. This article outlines hands you should play from different table positions.

Early Position

Only play premium hands 1010-AA and AJ-AK.

On a really tight table you can open your range slightly to include high broadway cards (face cards) or suited connectors, and if the players at the table are really bad you can slip in A10, 99 and 88 too. For short-handed games you can also play any pocket pair and you and suited-aces because these are the hands that will give you the nut flush on the flop.

With big pairs it’s crucial that you raise the pot 3-4BBs + 1BB for each limper. This is to prevent others from seeing the flop cheaply with drawing hands like 7d8d, top pairs don’t hold there value in multi-way pots. Another reason you need to raise the pot pre-flop with big pairs is because of something called “isolating hand ranges”. By raising pre-flop you give yourself a much better chance of reading your opponent post-flop and how likely he’ll have missed a board. For example, let’s say I raise the pot pre-flop with KK and get called by 2 players. On a flop like 5d-7h-10s, it’s extremely likely I’m ahead and I know my opponents will have missed. This is because after they called my pre-flop raise I can put them on a decent hand range of AJ+ or low-mid pocket pairs. If I failed to raise pre-flop, then I really have no idea what type of hand they have or whether I’m still ahead.

Hands like AK or AQ should almost always be raised in early position – similar to the reasons for high pocket pairs. These hands are in the top 5% of pre-flop starting hands and you definitely want to price out limpers from the pot. Also, if you only get called by one opponent there is a large chance you’ll still be ahead on the flop (about 60% of the time).

With mid-pairs like 1010 or 77 a raise is not necessary. Your aim should be to set-mine (i.e hope to catch a set on the flop cheaply). The reason we don’t raise these hands is because we want to build a multi-way pot with big implied odds just in case we hit our set.

With AJ or A10 we should just be limping too.

Middle Position

Here we can play all the hands above with the inclusion of J10 – KQ, and small-mid pocket pairs – on an un-raised board.

If you face a raise before you your non-premium hands should be folded, this means anything other than JJ-AA or AK. You can still call suited connectors and suited-aces some of the time for instance in short-handed games.

Basically, you ought to be limping with non-premium hands from mid-position in the hope of seeing cheap flops. Broadway cards KJ, KQ, QJ and J10 should all be limped, along with suited-aces and connectors and ultimately you want to be either hitting two pair or drawing to monster hands like the nut straight. Getting paid off with these hands is what makes them playable pre-flop.

When facing a raise with AA-JJ you should always re-raise (a sensible re-raise is 3x the opening raise). You’ll be ahead of your opponent beat and this also stops early position steals.

On a really loose/weak table you can also call raises with QK, QJ and KJ. And on an extremely passive and loose table i.e one filled with new players, you can call with suited connectors and low pairs for implied odds.

Late Position

You can play virtually any hand – except junk hands like 72o or 83o. You can limp into un-raised pots with low suited connectors, connected hands, non-connected suits, pocket pairs or J10+ – and you can also raise your junk hands to steal pots.

Most importantly you have to raise any hands like AA or KK. You cannot afford to let anyone see the flop cheaply and you have to get rid of all the marginal hands pre-flop. Remeber that big pocket pairs don’t have any value in multi-way pots with 3 or more people.

A tip for playing decent hands like QJ or 88 on an un-raised board from late position is to min-raise the pot by an additional blind (i.e. everyone must pay 2BBs to see the flop). This helps build pots with lots of “dead-money” which serves to increase your implied odds for hitting a monster.

Blinds

The blinds is very similar to early position strategy, except this is where the majority of people make mistakes. Because you’re out of position (first to act on every street after the flop) you cannot afford to call with marginal hands for fun. You don’t get the right sort of implied odds and you don’t know who’s going to re-raise the pot after you. The mistake people make on the blinds is that, because they’re already slightly committed they feel the “need” to call more chips to a raise – however this is not the case. Your positional disadvantage from the blinds makes calling with sub-par hands very bad equity play most of the time.

In fact, most of the hands good enough to call from the blinds are actually the type of hands you should be raising with in the first place. The only exception to this rule would be high suited connectors or broadway cards (J10-KQ).

With high pocket pairs you should open-raise as usual. You should only limp from SB/BB with less than premium hands on an extremely tight board. There may also be occasions where you can afford to call a raise that comes round to you with marginal hands like 7d8d. in these cases, the size of the pot once you call and with loose players around you will encourage others to limp in also – which help improve your implied odds.

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NL Hold’em Starting Hand Charts

Top 10 Starting Hands In No Limit Poker Bonus

One aspect of the game of No-Limit Hold’em that causes beginning players much grief is deciding which hands to play and which hands to dump. NL Hold’em is much more difficult than Limit Hold’em because the value of a hand depends on so many factors other than just the cards in your hand. Despite this difficulty, our coaches believe that following some general guidelines and adjusting from these is a better solution than having no guidelines at all. Given that well over half of your profitability in NL Hold’em is based on hand selection alone, we have developed these charts to help you better determine whether to play or fold.

There are no perfect No-Limit starting hand charts. That is because there are many factors that affect your decision, and charts cannot account for all of them. Some of these include:

1. The size of your opponent's stacks.
2. How loose or tight, passive or aggressive, your opponents are.
3. Where these opponents are located at the table – for example, does an aggressive player still have to act after you?
4. Your image at the table – for example, how tight or tricky you are perceived.

That being said, these charts will serve you well in most typical low-stakes No-Limit cash games, such as games with blinds of $1/$2, and home games. These games typically have several loose players at the table, and good opportunities for winning big pots with suited connectors and pocket pairs. With practice, you will be able to be a consistently winning player with these charts as a starting point. As you improve, you'll find yourself making adjustments to these charts based on the factors listed above, and more.

AGAIN: These charts are a good starting point for beginners. Specifically, Chart #1 recommends a significant amount of limping. This is great in loose, passive games but less often seen in tougher games. You’ll find other training material on Advanced Poker Training that may recommend a more aggressive approach for more experienced players.

Note: It would be a serious mistake to apply these hand charts before reading the Frequent Asked Questions first.

CHART #1 ‐ LOOSE, PASSIVE GAME (OFTEN 4-5 LIMPERS PER HAND)
NO ONE HAS RAISED YET

• Raise Always
• Call from Early Position, otherwise raise
• Call always
• Call from Middle or Late Position if the conditions are right (see Frequently Asked Questions)

CHART #2 ‐ TIGHTER GAME (FEWER LIMPERS) OR MORE AGGRESSIVE GAME
NO ONE HAS RAISED YET

• Raise Always
• Call from Early Position, otherwise raise
• Call (or Raise) from Middle or Late Position if the conditions are right (see Frequently Asked Questions)

CHART #3 ‐ THERE HAS BEEN A SINGLE RAISE
(3‐5 TIMES THE BIG BLIND) BEFORE YOU

• Re‐Raise Always
• Call from Early Position, otherwise re‐raise
• Call always
• Call from Middle or Late Position if the conditions are right (see Frequently Asked Questions)

FREQUENTLY ASKED QUESTIONS

For the hands in yellow, what do you mean when you say to play these hands if the conditions are right? The hands in yellow are speculative hands. They should always be folded from Early Position. From other positions, they can be profitable given the right conditions. Some of the questions to ask yourself:

1. Are there other players who have called so far (the more, the better)?
2. Are the players who have called playing poorly after the flop? Will they pay me off if I hit something?
3. Is there an aggressive player still to act behind me (you might get raised and have to fold)?
4. If there has been a raise and no other callers, what chance do I have of using my position after the flop to win the hand even if I don't improve (Chart #3 only)?

Why does Chart #2 say to sometimes raise with the hands in yellow, but Chart #1 does not? We have different goals in mind. Using Chart #1, we want to call to encourage additional players to enter the pot. These hands will be immensely profitable when our loose, passive opponents enter the hand, and get trapped when we flop a set, or make a well-disguised straight. When using Chart #2, however, we want to size up the opponents still to act. If they are tight, we can raise. Sometimes, we'll pick up the blinds. Other times, our pre-flop aggression will allow us to take down the pot on the flop.

What's the difference between AKs and AKo? AKs means an Ace and King of the same suit. AKo means an Ace and King of different suits.

What are early, middle, and late position? Early Position is generally the first 2 (in a nine player game) or 3 (in a ten player game) positions after the blinds. Late Position is the “cutoff” position (to the right of the dealer), and dealer button positions. Middle Position is everything in between.

How much should I raise? As a general rule, raise 3 to 4 times the big blind, plus 1 extra big blind for every player who has called before you. So if there are 2 callers already, raise between 5 and 6 times the big blind.

Top 10 Starting Hands In No Limit Poker Rules

What if someone raises after I call? Whether you call the raise depends on how much money the raiser has for you to win, how many other players are involved, and what type of hand you have. As a general rule, if you have a pocket pair, lean towards calling. If there are a lot of other players (and therefore a big pot), lean towards calling. In general, fold suited connectors from early position. Fold hands like KQ that don't play well against a raiser.

Top 10 Starting Hands In No Limit Poker Tournaments

How do I play from the blinds? From the small blind, play the same hands you would play from late position, plus a few more. But don't call with junk hands like T5o, just because it is “cheap”. From the big blind, if there is a raise to you, play like you would if you had already called from early position.

The chart says to fold KQo to a raise. Really? Yes, this hand performs very poorly against typical raising hands. Against AK, AQ, AA, KK, QQ, you are a big underdog. Other typical raising hands like JJ, TT, 99, AJs, are slightly ahead of you as well. The only time you might call or re-raise is from late position, if the opener was in middle or late position, indicating they might have a wider range of hands.

I was told to fold AJo from Early Position, why do you say to call with it? Folding AJo is not a bad idea in many games. We included it because, at low stakes tables (even tight or aggressive ones), the players are often playing badly enough after the flop that it can be profitable. We used data from millions of hands of low-limit poker to analyze this. The same could be said for KQo, ATs, and KJs – you can make a small profit in the long run at most low-stakes games, but folding would be perfectly acceptable from early position.

Can I use these charts in a NL Hold'em tournament? The charts would be best applicable to the early stages of a NL tournament, when everyone has a deep stack. In the middle and later stages, they should not be used.

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