How to Play Video Poker

This guide is intended for video poker novices looking to play at an internet casino. Someone looking to learn how to play video poker will benefit from this tutorial.

Video Poker is a game of skill and luck which is very popular in land based casinos, online casinos, and even neighborhood bars, where they are legal. Video Poker is very fast to learn and can be very cheap to play making it appealing to the average gambling novice. At the same time, the cost per hand can be escalated, making it great for high rollers as well. With each hand taking as little as a 15 seconds, or longer if you wish to think more about the options the game can be played at about any speed confortable to you, the player.

The goal of video poker is to obtain the best poker hand. 5 cards are dealt to you and you choose which cards to hold. The remaining cards are discarded and replaced by new cards from the virtual deck of cards. The new hand is graded, looking for the following typical winning hands:

• Jacks or Better - a pair of matching ranks, Jacks, Queens, Kings, or Aces
• Two Pairs - 2 pairs of matching ranks
• 3 of a Kind - a set, 3 cards of the same rank
• Straight - 5 cards, sequentially ranked with no gaps
• Flush - All 5 cards are the same suit, of any rank
• Full House - A 3 of a kind and a separate pair in the same 5 card hand
• 4 of a Kind - 4 cards of the same rank
• Straight Flush - A straight and a flush... All 5 cards sequentially ranked AND all the same suit
• Royal Flush - A straight flush of ranks 10, J, Q, K, A (in any suit)

There is some video poker strategy you might want to follow. But overall you want to try and get the biggest return on your bet. If you already have a hand which includes Jacks or Better, is it worth throwing that away if you are one card away from a straight flush? A lot of the time, the video poker software will help you decide on the best play by holding cards it thinks is the best bet. Some casinos have better strategy than others, so don't hesitate to go with something different. Part of the fun is deciding whether to play it safe or make a bigger risk in an attempt for a bigger reward. And video poker offers odds as high as 1000:1 to hit a royal flush.

There are many variations on Video Poker. For the most part, only three things change to generate all the different variations:

• Wild Cards

Some games add jokers to the deck, some declare certain cards wild. For example, "deuces wild", as the name implies, all the 2's are wild and can substitute for any other card in the deck
• Pay Table

Gameplay for video poker is generally the same all the time. However, even if the rules are the same, the pay tables can be changed. For example, "aces and faces" pays larger amounts if your hand ends with a four of a kind of rank Jack, Queen, or King... And usually an even bigger payoff for four aces.

Video Poker can also be played with multi-hand games. These are increasingly popular because they allow for bigger hands to be won. In multi hand poker, you are dealt the same 5 cards and choose which to hold - the same as in normal video poker. However, upon replacing the cards, that step is repeated once for every hand you have paid for. While overall the odds are the same with multiple hands as single hands, when you have 4, 10, 50, even 100 chances to make that big hand, it becomes more exciting. Royal flushes, while still not commonplace, occur much more frequently. Just realize even betting just 5 cents per hand will cost $5 per game when you play 100 hands.

What type of Video Poker Should I play?
This is not something that can be answered for you. Gambling is entertainment, so do you want to win the most number of hands, even if they pay less or do you enjoy going for the big dollar hands? Playing games with lots of wild cards definitely increases your chances of winning hands, although frequently you will need at least 2 pair to have a winning hand. And playing games with strict rules often has better payouts. Just realize no matter what game you choose, the casino still has the odds slightly in their favor. The crazier the game, the better the house advantage usually is.