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Cheat sheet
- Pre-flop, raise 4×: any pair from 3-3, any ace, K-x suited, K-5 offsuit+, Q-6 suited+, Q-8 offsuit+, J-8 suited+, J-10 offsuit+
- Flop, bet 2×: two pair or better, a hidden pair (not pocket deuces), four to a flush with a 10 or better of the suit in your hand
- River, bet 1×: a hidden pair or better, or fewer than 21 dealer outs
- Otherwise check, and fold on the river
Keys: 4, 2 or 1 to bet, C to check, F to fold, Enter for the next hand. The trainer follows the standard simple strategy, which gives up only a small fraction of a percent against perfect play. Practice only: your score stays in this browser.
- Maths reviewed by Josh Miller
- Tested by Diana Westfield
This Ultimate Texas Hold’em trainer deals full hands and stops you at each street: raise 4x or check before the flop, bet 2x or check on the flop, bet 1x or fold on the river. It’s free, there’s no money, and every answer comes with the reason. On the river it counts the dealer outs for you, which is the part nobody can do in their head at first.
The game moves quickly and the big decision comes first, before you’ve seen a single community card. That’s why a few minutes of Ultimate Texas Hold’em practice pays off more than in most table games.
Ultimate Texas Hold’em trainer: street by street
You see your two cards with the dealer’s and the board face down. Raise with key 4 or check with C. Check, and the flop comes, then 2 or C. Check again, and the river, then 1 or F. As soon as you put money in, the hand ends and the dealer’s cards turn over so you can see what would have happened, though one hand tells you nothing about whether the decision was right.
“Flop decisions” and “River decisions” skip straight to those streets with hands that got there by correct play.
The simple strategy behind the answers
Before the flop, raise 4x with any pair from 3-3 up, any ace, any suited king, K-5 offsuit or better, Q-6 suited or Q-8 offsuit and better, and J-8 suited or J-10 offsuit and better. Pocket deuces are the odd one out: check.
On the flop, bet 2x with two pair or better, with a hidden pair (one that uses your own card, except pocket deuces), or with four to a flush when you hold a 10 or better of that suit. On the river, bet 1x with a hidden pair or better. Without one, count how many unseen cards would give the dealer a better hand using the board. The line sits at 21: under it you put the 1x in, at 21 or over you let it go. Counting dealer outs feels slow at first, so the CasinoCalcs trainer shows the count after every river spot, and after a while a board with 15 of them stops looking scary while one with 25 starts to.
Is it perfect? No, but the gap to a computer-perfect strategy is a few hundredths of a percent, small enough that we’d never bother learning the full version for a night at the tables.
More Ultimate Texas Hold’em practice
Keep the Ultimate Texas Hold’em strategy chart open while you practise, and look at the casino poker house edge table to see how the game compares. If you play regular Hold’em too, the poker trainer drills opening ranges by seat. The Three Card Poker trainer and the others are on the casino game trainers page.
Knowing the maths doesn’t remove the house edge. BeGambleAware.org is free and confidential if it stops being fun.