Poker Hands Position Chart

 
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Poker Hand Rankings & Charts: Evaluate Your Poker Cards. Before you take us up on our free poker money offer on your way to becoming a World Series of Poker champion, you must first master the basics. The most important in the game is to understand the poker hand strength and rankings. Key for PokerStove Hand Range Charts:-Green for all the pairs-Red for suited hands (everything up and right of the pairs) These hands also have a little s after them-Grey for offsuit hands (everything down and left of the pairs) These hands also have a little o after them-Yellow for a hand that has been selected. So in any given chart. In middle position, players will open with medium pocket pairs, suited aces, even hands like J-10 suited. As a result, the kinds of poker hands you should call with also expand.

Table Of Contents

Are you struggling to figure out what starting hands to play and how poker positions change the way you play preflop? You are not alone.

This article isn't a poker strategy crash course. Instead of focusing on generic winning poker tips and bankroll management advice like many other training poker sites do, it gives you something different.

It's a collection of advanced poker charts that improves your poker game by showing you how to play preflop. It gives you a clear overview of the starting hands range you should consider through some handy poker hands chart images, PDFs, and Excel files.

Continue reading to learn:

  • And lots more

In other words, if you are looking for an in-depth game strategy guide to learn what is the best way to play poker preflop, you'll love this collection of poker range charts.

Why a Page about Poker Ranges?

All poker players have been there. Short-stacked. Bleeding chips with every orbit while staring at junk hand after junk hand. Feeling their chances of winning the tournament dwindle ever further while their stack continues to shrink.

Finally, they get a halfway decent hand. Nobody has entered the pot.

Is it time to shove?

There's an easy way to find out. Enter poker range charts. These handy tools allow players to see which poker hand ranges to play in preflop scenarios where the pot is unopened and a player plans to shove or fold.

Playing the proper ranges according to preflop charts make it so your play can't be exploited, so memorizing these is the key to short-stacked play.

Read on to learn more and find the accompanied printable poker hand ranges chart as a tool you can study to improve your performance when short-stacked.

What are poker ranges?

For those unfamiliar a poker hand range is simply a set of poker hands that may be held by a player. We try to estimate our opponents' ranges because guessing exact hole cards is a fruitless, nearly impossible exercise in most cases.

For example, if the tightest player you've ever seen reraises you preflop in hold'em, you may estimate their range to be aces and kings only.

On the other hand, if a player who hasn't folded one hand in an hour calls your raise, you may estimate their range to include any two cards in the deck. Of course, most hand ranges will be somewhere in between.

How Do You Calculate Poker Ranges?

Analyzing ranges can be a tricky proposition, and only by learning game theory and playing thousands of hands can a poker player get better at it.

Including some proper proper preflop strategy in your poker training will help you understand what poker hand ranges they'll play.

The more time you spend playing and watching opponents' hands at showdown, the more clues you'll get about their strategy. That will enable you to get more precise estimates of their ranges when playing future hands.

This video from poker pro Jonathan Little explores the concept in a little more depth and tries to answer the question 'how do I think in terms of hand ranges?'

How to Use Preflop Range Charts

Every position at the poker table has a certain range of starting hands that can be profitably shoved at a given stack depth.

Generally, these stack depths are at 20 big blinds or less.

Preflop range charts outline the hands that constitute a winning shoving range.

A player who knows these charts can shove with a positive expected value (+EV) no matter what cards are held by the opponents remaining to act.

Here on PokerNews you find free preflop poker charts for five different stack depths at both six-max tables and nine-handed tables.

Here's how to use them:

  1. Figure out how many big blinds you have in your stack.
  2. Go to the corresponding chart. If you have a stack that doesn't match one exactly, pick the closest one.
  3. Go to the column that corresponds to your seat.
  4. Scroll down until you get to the row that corresponds to your hole cards — the chart starts with pairs at the top, then ace-high hands, then king-high and so on.
  5. You can shove all of the hands listed there, as well as any hands to the left that were shoved in an earlier seat.
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Poker Ranges Charts

Here are 10 essential poker charts to help your preflop poker game.

They're broken into two categories: full-ring ranges and six-max ranges. Each category features shoving hands for five different stack sizes, raised in increments of three big blinds.

Hands

As you'll often have stacks in between these sizes, it may take a small amount of guesswork and intuition to expand or tighten the ranges a bit and get the appropriate strategy.

1. Full Ring Ranges Poker Charts

2. Six-Max Ranges Poker Charts

Use the Printable Poker Charts on Excel!

Want to bring all the poker charts with you? Make a copy of this shared Excel file and download the full collection of our advanced poker charts.

To create your own copy of all the poker charts on this article:

  • Click on 'File'
  • Then click on 'Create a Copy'
  • Done! You can now use all these poker ranges charts to improve your win rate!

These are optimal poker ranges for winning chips if your opponents are calling correctly. Each poker chart should be adjusted depending on reads you can gather when you play cash games or tournament poker.

  • If your opponents are calling too wide, shove a little tighter so you're more likely to have the best of it.
  • If your opponents aren't calling wide enough, widen your range of hands and shove a few extra hands because you are likely to be able to steal their blinds.

Considerations should also be made for the state of the poker tournament, i.e. proximity to the money bubble, a pay jump, or a final table.

These can heavily influence calling ranges and proper shoving strategy, changing the way you should play if you are using these poker charts to play winning poker.

Some bits of the poker ranges charts may look a bit weird, specifically in regard to suited ace-high hands.

This is because some of the small suited aces perform slightly better against calling ranges than middle aces. At certain stack depths and positions, it's better to shove ace-five suited than ace-seven suited, for example.

How to memorize poker ranges

Given that there are 169 different hands in Texas hold'em poker, differently sized tables, and slightly different shoving ranges for every stack depth, it's unreasonable to think you'll be able to perfectly memorize an exactly correct shoving strategy.

Furthermore, doing so would probably be counter-productive, as you're better off dedicating your brainpower and efforts elsewhere.

Getting a rough idea of correct preflop poker ranges to shove will allow you to play well with a short stack while still improving your game in other aspects with your remaining study time.

Poker Hands Position Chart Free

There's no handy acronym like 'Roy G. Biv' (rainbow colors) or 'PEMDAS' (order of mathematical operations) to help you remember the shoving strategy offered in all the preflop range charts on this page.

And despite what other poker guides and poker training sites say, the purpose of poker charts like these ones is not to have you memorise everything. That's not how you will improve your win rate.

The best way to learn is to make your shoves and then continually check afterward whether it was correct. Eventually, the raising ranges will start to take shape in your memory.

Here are a few poker tips to keep in mind:

  • Pairs are great to jam with. If you're under 10 big blinds, you can almost jam with any pair from any position. With such a small stack, waiting for top pairs is not a good idea.
  • If your cards are unpaired, it's obviously preferable to have high suited cards.
  • Small suited hands lose a lot of value in preflop shoving situations compared to their deep-stacked playability. Many hands wind up unimproved by the river, so the higher cards will win in these spots.
  • Still, hands with a high card and low card (something like king-five offsuit) might be favored against something like ten-nine suited in a head-to-head clash, but the latter performs better against opponents' calling hands, so it's preferable to shove with.
  • The biggest jumps in shoving range will come the closer you get to the big blind — i.e., the difference between shoving in the first two seats is far less than the difference in shoving between the button and small blind.

    This is because one extra fold represents a much bigger portion of the remaining opponents, meaning the likelihood of running into a big hand has decreased more significantly. So, get comfortable shoving very wide in the small blind and still quite wide from the button and cutoff.

Most Common Preflop Ranges

All percentile ranges you see below are taken from pokerhandrange.com

Top 7%

If you run into a very tight opponent, expect here or she to be opening something like the top 7% of hands from early or even middle position. Only the tightest ranges will play this way.

What does that look like? About as strong as you'd expect:

  • 88
  • ATs , AQo
  • KJs

Top 15%

Opening the top 15% of hands is still quite tight, but allows a bit more play down to the strong offsuit Broadways, most of the suited aces, and all of the suited Broadways.

It's probably close to a 'typical' opening range for a standard live player:

  • 66
  • A5s , ATo
  • K9s , KJo
  • Q9s , JTs

Top 35%

If you run into a player who is aggressively trying to steal seemingly every time it's folded to them in late position, their range might be in the top 35% or so of hands, or potentially even wider.

That's going to include a great many suited combos with even just one Broadway, as well as some fairly weak offsuit holdings down to jack-nine:

  • 33
  • A2s , A5o
  • K2s , K8o
  • Q4s , Q9o
  • J7s , J9o
  • T7s
  • 97s
  • 87s

Top 60%

Only the absolute loosest, most aggressive opposition will play a range this wide, but it certainly does happen.

The top 60% is usually reserved for short-stacked players shoving from the button and small blind, so if you wonder what that range might look like, here it is:

  • 22
  • Ax
  • K2s , K3o
  • Q2s , Q5o
  • J2s , J7o
  • T2s , T7o
  • 94s , 97o
  • 84s
  • 74s
  • 64s
  • 54s

Additional Readings

Now that you have our starting hands range and you have all the information you need on your Excel printable file, it's time to continue this poker lab experiment with more poker guides.

If you are really committed to playing better poker, here's a list that will help you reach your goals.

  • Essential Poker Tips: a complete collection of the most effective poker tips we know. While some might be more beginner-oriented, other tidbits might help also more seasoned players.
  • Poker Equity: one of the most popular poker articles ever published in our advanced poker strategy section. This is one of those must-read poker guides you need to go through at least once in your (poker) life.
  • Poker Positions: having our printable poker range charts in PDF is not enough to become a winning poker player. You need a lot more — including this guide to poker positions. Learn how every position named at the table and learn how to use everything to your advantage when you fire up your poker software.
  • The Best Online Poker Sites: the world-famous and award-winnings PokerNews rankings. If you ever wanted to play a hand of online poker, this is the perfect starting point for you.
  • Mobile Poker Sites: some poker software a great on desktop, but how about their mobile apps? Read this one to find out what brands offer the top mobile products in the industry.
  • Free Poker Sites: Not all online games cost money. All the sites on this list offer great poker games that will cost you nada.
  • Poker Freerolls: want to win real money prizes but don't want to risk your own? play a freeroll! This page gives you access to all the top free poker tournaments happening right now.

Additional Note:

The shoving ranges in this article, while available in many forms on different poker resources, were specifically taken from SnapShove. Check out SnapShove for more information about preflop shoving and calling strategy.

Now that you understand the position concept we are going to expand on that by looking at the subject of which starting hands to play and which to throw in the muck.

This is the area where inexperienced players become fish, simply by not having the ability to fold weak hands before the flop. You can save a lot of money at this stage of the hand just by simply choosing not to play.

The Importance of Starting Hand Selection

As you know Poker is a game of maths and probability. It is therefore possible to know which starting hands are most probable to win a hand and this has been statistically proven in many studies. These studies have been able to rank starting hands according to how likely they are to win the hand against a random selection of opponent’s starting hands.

Starting hand

By Starting Hand we mean the two hole cards which are dealt to you at the start of each hand.

Since we now know which are the best starting hands in poker then we can apply this knowledge to our strategy. Remember, when we play a hand, we want to play with the odds in our favour, and by selectively choosing which starting hands we play we can ensure this.

Of course if we just waited for the two or three best poker starting hands then we wouldn’t actually play many hands as the probability of these cards being dealt is only once in a while.

So we combine the position concept with our starting hand concept, to allow us to only play a narrow starting hand selection when out of position and to play a wider range of starting hands when we are in position. Therefore the benefit of playing in position makes up for the weaker starting hands we may play.

Starting Hand Groups

You could look at all the statistical information and studies, but we’ve taken all the work out of it for you. The following section is a key part of your strategy and you should practise choosing the right action before the flop using the poker starting hands chart below.

We have chosen 46 different hands that we will play depending on the position and situation we are in. Those 46 hands have been separated into 8 groups named Group A to H. Group A are the strongest hands in poker based on the statistics and group H are the weakest hands that we are willing to play. Of course there are many more hand combinations weaker than the hands in Group H, but we are not interested in playing with these and they will be folded into the muck straight away.

Group B

AK

QQ

Group D

AQs

AQ

AJs

99

88

Group F

AT

KQ

KJs

QJs

44

33

22

Group H

KJ

KT

QJ

J8s

T8s

87s

76s

The ‘s’ next to some of the hands stands for Suited, so two cards of the same suit. ‘AJs’ could stand for A J whereas ‘AJ’ could stand for A J

Take a minute just to browse the hands in each group, you don’t need to memorise these, as you can use the chart to refer to, and once you have used it for a while, you will start to remember which hands are in which groups.

Poker Starting Hand Charts

Ok, so now we have our selection of 46 hands, and have split them into 8 groups based on strength, now what? Well we won’t just automatically play any of those 46 hands when they are dealt to us, we will make a decision based on the position we are in, and the situation we are faced with at the table.

When we are in position we will play a wider range of groups and out of position we will only play the stronger groups. Similarly when opponents have shown strength at the table by raising we will only play the better cards against them.

There are three charts, UNRAISED, RAISED and BLINDS. These are our Action charts, and show us what action to take when we have a hand in one of the starting hand groups.

The three charts are:

  • UNRAISED – When everybody acting before you has either folded or called the big blind.
  • RAISED – When somebody acting before you has raised.
  • BLINDS – When you are in either the small blind or the big blind position and somebody acting before you has raised
UNRAISED
Everybody acting before you has either Folded or Called the Big Blind
ActionEarly PositionMid PositionLate Position
Opening RaiseA B C DA B C D EA B C D E F
Call a Re-RaiseB CCC D
Raise a Re-RaiseAA BA B
Call the Big Blind (if Multiway Pot)F GG H
RAISED
Someone acting before you has Raised already
ActionEarly PositionMid PositionLate Position
Re-RaiseA BA BA B
CallCCC D
BLINDS
After a Raise and You are in the Blinds
ActionRaised from Early PositionRaise from Mid PositionRaised from Late Position
Unraised Blinds – Play as if you were in Late Position in the Unraised chart
Re-RaiseAA B CA B C D
CallB C DD EE F

To use the charts, just follow these steps:

  1. What group is your starting hand in? if it isn’t in any group then you Fold.
  2. What Situation are you in? Choose one of the three action charts relevant to the situation you are in.
  3. What Position are you in? Look at the column in the chart for the position you are in.
  4. Starting Hand Group not shown? If your starting hand group is not shown in that column, then you Fold.
  5. Starting Hand Group Shown? If your starting hand group letter is shown then take the action the chart is showing you.

The different actions in each of the charts are:

  • Opening Raise – Make the first Raise
  • Call – Just Call when a person has Raised
  • Re-Raise – Re-Raise a person who has Raised
  • Call a Re-Raise – Call when someone Re-Raises your original Raise
  • Raise a Re-Raise – Re-Raise when somebody has Re-Raised your original Raise
  • Call the Big Blind – Just call the big blind amount (also known as ‘limping in’)

Quick Reference

I don’t expect you to memorise all the starting hand groups and action charts. The way to learn them is by putting them into practise and then over time you will start to memorise them. But to start with, you can refer to the charts while you are playing.

You can either just bookmark and pull this page up each time you play or we have a couple of other methods to make your life a bit easier.

Printable Starting Hands Chart

A neat and tidy, A4 size starting hand chart which you can print and keep in front of you for quick reference while you are playing.

To download the Starting Hands Chart right click on the link and select save target as.

It is a PDF file, so to view and print this you will need the free Adobe Acrobat Reader. If you don’t have this you can download it here.

Starting Hands Chart Desktop Wallpaper

Use this as your computer desktop wallpaper. It is designed so that whilst you are playing poker, you can place your poker table window over the Poker Professor logo and all the charts will be visible around the table. Neat huh!

To download the Starting Hands Wallpaper right click on the link and select save target as.

To set as your desktop wallpaper, right click on the file you have just downloaded and select “Set As Desktop Background”.

The wallpaper is optimised for a desktop screen size of 1920×1080 as this is the most common. It should work with most other desktop sizes as well as windows should automatically resize it for you.

Starting Hand Examples

Lets take a look at some example starting hands and walk through what the charts are telling you to do and what thought process to follow.

Example Hand 1

You are sitting in early position and are dealt A J. You are first to act and so nobody has bet before you.

  • What group is my hand in – AJ is a Group E hand
  • What situation am I in – Nobody has raised before me so UNRAISED
  • What position am I in – Early Position

So from the answers to the above questions we look at the UNRAISED Action chart, and look in the column for Early Position. You will see that Group E is not shown in that column so we are not allowed to play a Group E hand in Early position in this situation and so we would fold this hand.

Example Hand 2

You are sitting in early position and are dealt A K. You are first to act and so nobody has bet before you.

  • What group is my hand in – AK is a Group B hand
  • What situation am I in – I am first to act so it is UNRAISED
  • What position am I in – Early Position

So from the above we look at the UNRAISED Action chart, and look in the column for Early Position. You will see that with a group B hand we are told to make an opening raise. So we would enter the hand by making a Raise (We will look at details of how much to raise later in the lesson).

Example Hand 3

You are sitting in Mid Position and are dealt A A. A Player in early position has raised the pot up to 3 times the Big Blind.

  • What group is my hand in – AA is the best starting hand and therefore a Group A hand
  • What situation am I in – There has been a raise by a player in early position, so it has been RAISED
  • What position am I in – Mid Position

So, we look at the RAISED Action chart, and look in the column for Mid Position. You will see that with a group A hand we are told to make a Re-Raise. So we would enter the hand by making a Re-Raise. (We will look at details of how much to raise later in the lesson)

Example Hand 4

You are sitting in Mid Position and are dealt 9 9. A Player in early position has raised the pot up to 3 times the Big Blind.

  • What group is my hand in – 99 is a Group D hand
  • What situation am I in – There has been a raise by a player in early position, so it has been RAISED
  • What position am I in – Mid Position

So, again we look at the RAISED Action chart, and look in the column for Mid Position. You will see that we are not allowed to play an already RAISED pot in Mid Position with a group D hand. So we fold this hand.

Example Hand 5

You are sitting in Late Position and are dealt 8 7. Two Players acting before you have limped in and called the big blind.

  • What group is my hand in – 87s is a Group H hand
  • What situation am I in – There has been two limpers, but no raise, so it is UNRAISED
  • What position am I in – Late Position

So, we look at the UNRAISED Action chart, and look in the column for Late Position. You will see that we are allowed to Call a Multi-way pot with a group H hand (multiple players playing the hand). As two people have already called and the blinds will likely also call we can call the big blind and play the hand. So we would call the big blind on this hand.

How much should I Raise?

Chart

An opening Raise in general should be between 3 to 4 times the Big Blind. Anywhere in this range is ok, and as guide to start with I would raise the following amounts:

Hands

Poker Table Position Chart

  • When you are in EARLY POSITION Raise 4 times the Big Blind
  • When you are in MID POSITION Raise 3.5 times the Big Blind
  • When you are in LATE POSITION Raise 3 times the Big Blind

You should mix and match the size of your raises to prevent your opponents getting a read on your betting patterns, but the above can act as a general guide whilst you get used to your new strategy.

The reason to Raise more in Early position is because we are out of position and want to put as much pressure on our opponents as we can.

How much should I Re-Raise?

Poker Hands Table Position

A Re-Raise should in general be between 2 – 4 times the original Raise, As a guide:

  • When it has been Raised from EARLY POSITION Raise 2 times the Raise
  • When it has been Raised from MID POSITION Raise 3 times the Raise
  • When it has been Raised from LATE POSITION Raise 4 times the Raise

The reason for this is it is more likely that a player in late position has raised with a weaker hand than a player in Early position.

Practise Time

Poker Hands Position Chart

Well, that was a lengthy lesson and a lot to take in. Don’t worry, with practise it will start to become second nature, and that is exactly what you should do now with the first stage of your bankroll challenge.

Poker Bankroll Challenge: Stage 1

  • Stakes: $0.02/$0.04
  • Buy In: $3 (75 x BB)
  • Starting Bankroll: $25
  • Target: $3 (1 x Buy In)
  • Finishing Bankroll: $28
  • Estimated Sessions: 1

Use this exercise to get used to selecting which starting hands to play and which not to play according to the Starting Hands chart and get used to understanding what position you are in at the table. Don’t get too carried away at this stage though, play conservatively and be aware that someone may have a better hand than you. We are going to learn in more detail about betting after the flop later in the course.