Online Poker – Game Rules, Hand Rankings, and Casinos

Online Poker is a casino game in which you can expect the unexpected. It's a game of skill and with the help of our guide and your responsible gambling, you might end up a winner.

Playing online poker can be just as exciting as a game session in a brick-and-mortar casino. With the lightspeed development of technologies, enjoying your gambling time is inevitable. Obviously, the benefit of playing poker online or any other casino game is that you decide from where you want to play. So turn on your computer, open a beer and let’s see how we can help you improve your gameflow. 

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Online Poker - Hand Rankings and Rules

The term poker refers to any card game in which the player’s hand is ranked by the available cards. A winner of the hand is the one holding the best ranking hand during the “showdown” or the one who made the last uncalled bet.

The highest value Poker Online hand is the royal flush, followed by straight flush, four of a kind, full house, flush, straight, three of a kind, two pair, pair, and high card.

Basic Poker Rules

In Poker, you play from a standard 52 card deck. These cards are ranked from high to low as followed: Ace, King, Queen, Jack, 10,9,8,7,6,5,4,3,2, Ace. There are four suits, spades, hearts, diamonds and clubs. All poker hands contain five cards, and the highest hand wins. There are also wild cards, which can take on whatever suit and rank the person holding the card wants. Jokers can typically be used as wild cards.

Hands are ranked as followed:

1.       Royal Flush

2.       Straight Flush

3.       Four of a Kind

4.       Full House

5.       Flush

6.       Straight

7.       Three of a Kind

8.       Two Pair

9.       Pair

10.   High Card

In some poker variants where they use wild cards the best hand you can get is five of a kind.

When betting, you can:

  • Call – bet enough to match what has been bet since the last time you placed a bet.
  •  Raise – you raise the bet to an amount you want, but there is a limit.
  • Fold – you drop out of the current play.
online poker game

Most poker games incorporate the basic poker rules and hand rankings mentioned above. In other words, players try to form the best five-card poker hand.

That being the case, playing the same game over and over again can become stale, and as such, players around the world have invented variants. Some of the most popular variants of poker, played across the entire world by a multitude of players include Texas Hold’em, Omaha and 7-card Stud.

Texas Hold’em

Texas Hold’Em poker is possibly one of the most popular variants. The rules are simple, as every player is dealt two cards, which only they can see. The dealer spreads five cards afterward, starting with three, then another, followed by the last one, which can be used by all of the players to make their best five-card hand. Before and after each and every card is revealed, players take turns to bet. The best hand wins.

Omaha

Omaha poker is one of those variants of poker which is made by the community. It shares a lot of similarities to the Texas Hold’em Variant of the game; however, each player is dealt four cards and has to make their best hands by only using two of them, alongside three of the five community cards. It uses a 52-card French deck as-well, which makes things interesting and adds a higher level of strategy. This is what makes Omaha poker online great.

7-card Stud

When it comes to the 7-card stud variant of the game, it is played using two downward-facing cards, as well as one upward card dealt before the first round of betting is made available, which is then followed by three more upcards. There is a betting round after each of the three cards are dealt, and finally, one more downward card. After the last downward card has been placed, the final round begins, where the best five-card poker hand wins.

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Tips and Strategies

There are plenty of Poker strategies out there made by professional players, as well as ones backed up by research, which can truly help you improve your game. However, when it comes to the key-strategies and mechanics you can implement to improve your level of play, you can do the following. Focus on the basics of poker, and try to win as much as possible when you have the best hand. To do this efficiently, you need to know when the right time to fold occurs, which is typically at the start of the game.

Do not rely on unlikely draws and play with what you have, making your next move based on that information. Do not be predictable by calling each and every bet, without inevitably making a raise, boosting your level of confidence. If you feel confident, never hesitate before making a move, look at your cards, assess the situation as much as you can, and make the right judgment.

Live Poker Games and Tournaments

When it comes to playing online poker efficiently, you need to be consistent and enrol in as many poker tournaments as you can. Online poker tournaments work by letting players buy-in for the same amount and are given the same amount of tournament chips. Now, a player has the option to quit a cash game at any given time and can exchange any chips won for cash. Tournaments end when there is one winner who has all of the chips.

The beauty of online poker is the fact that there are plenty of live rooms available, where you can virtually sit down and begin the gameplay session by buying in the game. As the game goes along, and the stakes are raised, the buy-in amount may increase. You are then given virtual buttons to tap or click in order to fold, check, call or raise.

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Best Online Poker for Real Money Casinos

When it comes to the world of online poker, and online casinos as a whole the one key thing that separate the truly successful ones, from the less successful ones, is quite simply, how well they can emulate the feeling of playing poker in the real world and how close it resembles a live casino.

Sure, a lot of casinos do indeed offer great bonuses, welcome match poker bonus offers, and so on to get you inside and get you playing, however, the look, the feel, the sound, the speed at which the gameplay mechanics work, that is what makes you stay. After all, you are in a room with other real people, playing online poker for real money, and as such, you need to be immersed in the moment to take the game seriously and be in there for longer periods of times. The casino provider needs to have excellent banking opinions which are quick, live chat support, and a mobile-friendly design.

888 Casino

888 Casino is a casino operator owned by 888 Holdings PLC, and is regulated and licensed by the United Kingdom Gambling Commission as well as the Gibraltar Gambling Commission. The company offers poker games online, slots and live dealer games which are all RNG tested for randomness and are certified by an organization known as eCOGRA.

1xbet

Established in 2001, the 1xbet casino is a casino operator (repeating the word casino twice in one sentence is not advisable) licensed through a Curacao eGaming license. You can find a wide variety of games to choose from and an extensive library of live casino offers which should give any player a lot of entertainment.

Betway

Betway features an extensive library of online casino games, with over 750 options to choose from. They feature slots, table games and many variants of poker online games.

Free Online Poker Games

There are a few ways through which you can play free online poker games. Almost every casino provider out there will have a free poker variation of some kind, excluding video poker online games, where you can play online poker. These work by giving you virtual fake money to play with, where you do not have to make any deposits to play, however, any winnings you make cannot be withdrawn as well, and this method of play has proven successful with many poker online players.

This is an excellent opportunity to get into the world of Poker Online if you are a newcomer or to simply play the game with friends and enrol in free tournaments without a buy-in. Some of the best free poker games can be found on 888 casino, 1xbet and Betway, and they even offer live poker online.

Conclusion - Why Play Online Poker

One of the best things about choosing to play online poker at an online casino is the fact that you can access the game from just about anywhere, and even enrol in online tournaments.

This means that, if you are sitting at home, are stuck on a long bus ride, at the office, or even in the bathroom, you can simply open up the web browser on your phone, load up a casino website, and start playing poker online immediately.

FAQ

You can play free online poker with free online “fake” money, however, any winnings in this mode are virtual only and cannot be withdrawn as real-world cash.
Many online casino providers are constantly being audited by organizations such as eCOGRA in order to ensure that their games are fair. If the casino has a license as-well, it is completely fair.
When you make a deposit at an online casino, you are playing with real money, and as such, any of the winnings you make in online poker can be withdrawn in cash.