Topic: A Poker Odds Calculator is a Perfect Tool for Poker? (Read 573 times)

playing it aggressively preflop is always advisable, so you don't end up in family pots. against 3 random hands, AA only wins at showdown ~60% of the time. when you isolate one player before the flop (with a raise) you have much better chances of winning.


in micro/low stakes, a generic tight-aggressive style still works pretty well. in mid-high stakes, i agree that you need to switch things up.

Since a pair of aces is the best hand you can get pre-flop it makes sense to play aggressively with them, however there are many merits on playing your hand slowly and trapping your opponent especially if he is the aggressive type.

Also it makes sense to mix up the way you play to keep your opponents out of balance and always guessing about your playing style, and if you can incorporate this to your playing style you will become a more effective poker player.

This is a link to the top 5 traps of the decade, while that title is debatable you will see some impressive traps and the first one on the video is of a pocket pair of aces. Enjoy.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1VBKhAMSvNg

This perhaps doesn't need any deep skills to learn such as memorizing the deck because your intention is just to have fun. But if you are playing with your friends and there's still a huge bet involved, it is in your advantage to win if you are familiar with the cards you and your friends are holding.

But if you want to have fun and to look professional when playing with your friends online, you can use these Odds Calculator, it might not directly help but it will increase your chance of predicting the outcome of the game.

It all depends on what you are planning to do with poker. If you only play once every two weeks with friends, I get your approach. It's all about having fun. The variance in your cards is much higher.

But if you actually play thousands of hands over a longer period of time (good players easily play 4-8 tables at once on multiple screens) then going all in randomly is not the best approach. Over a long period of time AA will beat 26 off easily.

Same here. LOL!

It may sound absurd but I sometimes do all in if I have that card. No need to wait for the flop. Make the bad cards fold as early as possible and deprive them of ever seeing their probability of winning rise.

It is better to let the game end like a purely random game rather than have your pair of aces be defeated by a 2 and a 6. LOL!

even if you don't know the opponent's hand, you can still assign them a range of possible hands based on their table play, or just a generic range if you have no reads.

so, let's say you're facing a very active/aggressive raiser to your left who 3-bets ~ 2x per orbit, likes to barrel postflop, and has shown down some bluffs. you are dealt KQs and it folds around to you. you raise, he 3-bets. what is a range we can put him on? based on our limited history and assuming a full ring game, he is 3-betting preflop 22.2% of the time. assigning a generic range based on the top 22.2% of starting hands we have:


let's see how our equity holds up. preflop:



now, let's imagine a hypothetical flop. for simplicity's sake, we will avoid flush possibilities:



we're in good shape against villain's range, but he continuation bets on the flop and calls a raise. we see a turn card:



villain fires a 2nd barrel. what's our play?

unfortunately with this type of LAG player, we can't narrow his range all that much. this is why LAG players are tough to beat---they make you gamble with higher variance in order to defend your equity. we know he could have hit a set or a straight, or turned a stronger pair. after all, he did call the raise on the flop. we also he know he could have a weaker pair, he could be semi-bluffing a gutshot straight draw, etc

anyway, this is just to highlight a spot where i think people give the villain too much credit. yes, our equity dropped on the turn, but it's really important to consider villain's entire range rather than automatically assuming he made a better hand by the turn. LAG players are often skilled at reading players, especially OOP, so the likelihood that he called the flop raise based on pot odds and is bluffing the turn---knowing he can likely scare us off the hand---is still pretty decent.

This would be really helpful for the beginner's or the players who are trying to play the game more efficiently because this can help them win a game, But for the experienced players, I think they don't need this kind of tool because there is a possibility this tool can distract them or they could be dependent in this tool. As per the players who desperately want to win a game, Having this should be an advantage to them and can make their winning chance higher if his table mates are at his caliber level.

Of course for beginners out there who want to try this please remember that this is a tool to help them improve their skills and not by just relying in the tool all the time. This tool can be good training for self-improvement in terms of poker.

Well, I am in the realm of poker games and for years playing of this kind of game I did not consider that this calculator will help you while you are in actual sitting in your table or even in online poker. Doing the math will kill your time and perhaps you will interrupt from those tools. However, there are certain calculators if you want to find them I will drop link below.

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Indeed, for the beginners that is right. If you want to learn poker this will be the best thing for you, but as they said above, --this will not give exact results because of this tool cant guess what an in your opponent has. Perhaps a learning calculator for new players of poker but not in actual play.

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Links of calculators! [1] ^{https://www.cardschat.com/poker-odds-calculator.php} [2] ^{https://www.cardplayer.com/poker-tools/odds-calculator/texas-holdem}

Calculators like this have been around for a long time, they are good for the newbies since they can help you see more clearly the chances you can hit the hand you are looking for but once you have some experience in the game you will know how to do that in seconds, the real challenge of poker strives on being able to guess why your opponent is betting the way he does and if he has something better than what you have, this is very difficult to do when playing online but when playing live you can try to see any change on his behaviour and whether this change is favourable for you or not and then decide what to do with that information.

Indeed. Using this kind of tool will hurt your performance in gambling, and the essence of enjoyment of playing poker will be gone because when you play poker, you will only depend on using the odds calculator. I also think this kind of tool is not perfect for helping you to win because it will only give you chances or the probability if you will win or lose that it will not show you the exact outcome of the cards that will show in the hands of the dealer.

I think this is the same calculator that they are using at poker games streamed on television.
Right?
You can see percentage of winning of one player just as the camera saw his cards.
But it changes. Even a 2 and 3 of diamonds could get a high chance of winning once the flop happened.
Pair of Aces can lose any time once every card is facing up.
That is why I want to finish it at the start when I have that pair. 

I don't think it's a good tool for me, anything could happen.

In my experience, relying on such a calculator can hurt your performance. When using a program like this, I tended to focus too much on odds instead of just playing the game and focus on each player way of playing...
They can be great for beginners, but one should drop them as soon as possible and learn poker theory and strategies.

That is exactly what I meant. The probability calculator gives some numbers, taking into account the fact that he “knows” the opponent’s hand or gives these numbers with respect to all possible combinations. But the game situation is completely different from these calculations.

If you were an old player, chances are you're already playing around your mind the chances of the other side actually exceeding your hand. Even if the chances aren't 100% accurate, it should be somewhere close tbh, as long as you can take into account the cards in the table and your cards, it should be quite plausible. Still, this is the most basic since other skills that ignore the win/loss of the standoff such as bluffing can also be applied. Ofc, if you were to get the strongest hand, there'd be no way for a bluff to work lmao.
Well, the AA pair is a strong pair to start with but it doesn't necessarily guarantee a 100% chance of winning by the time river comes out. Tbf, the hand you have at the start just increases your chance of winning, not making sure you win. This honestly gives you more room to maneuver with imo unlike hands with numerical pairings that aren't near each other, 2 and 9, for example.

OP: I don't know! if to say the precise or perfect tool for the Poker, but if for the one that begins to play.

Many who are dedicated to playing ignore potodds, but at the beginning, those who want to be successful in the long term of poker have to play with potodds, pot odds are the brake, not to play with the heart.

You don't need a calculator, it's really a simple division that relates your bet to the chance of winning what is in the pot, versus the probability of your hand.

First you must learn what is your probability (odds) of winning a hand and with that you can calculate them doods.

In poker pot odds are constantly repeated, but opponents and situations are what change.

In conclusion, you need to learn how to calculate PotOdds in importance, that concept is what is really important, but first learn how to calculate Odds.

You can have AA the guy next to you AK and I'm holding 93 (my two cards are the same suit).

AA goes all in, the flop is QJ7 (the J7 are the same suit as my 93 so I call)

AK goes all in on the turn with a ten (AK now has all four suits)

on the river I get a suited card 5 so out of the three of us I win with a flush beating the unsuited straight and the lonely pair of AA's (my highest card is the Jack).

Waiting to see what cards come out goes a long way to determining whether or not to go all in no matter how attractive the cards might look.

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From my point of view, AK could have just as easily had 98 making a queen high unsuited straight, but I still know that my suited flush beats his unsuited straight.

Good tools and probably will help the gamblers to have higher chances of winning. I just realize about this calculator for poker.
However, can it be said as perfect tool for poker? I don't think that when going to play poker, someone really needs to use certain tools to win.
Imagine that all of the players in fact use the calculator at the same table and we don't know each other. What will happen? They also have the similar chance to win. It means that of course, the strategies and also how the game works will also really determine how the player will win or lose.

it's more complicated than that. in holdem, when it comes to starting hands, hand strength is not static. it changes relative to your opponent's holdings.

statistically, AA is the best possible starting hand. KK is the 2nd best possible starting hand. however, when it comes to AA vs KK, the KK player would be better off holding something like a low-mid suited connector like 65s, which would give him a 4.5% better chance of winning at showdown.





this represents the value of "live cards" where your opponent doesn't have you dominated pair over pair or out-kicked.

I thought about this: let's say you have AA in your arms. You go allin. And according to the odds calculator, your odds are ~ 90% (I didn’t check, I just guess as this information is not important for further discussion). But your real chances are less because if someone answers you, he (presumably) will have a stronger hand than the "average" with respect to which the chances are calculated.
I'm right?

@DoublerHunter, if you just start playing, you may find it useful.

But after playing a few thousand hands, you will know the odds without even think of. And in most cases, you need to know approximates. E.g. AK vs AQ ~75%/25% without bothering for perfection. Those are called basic preflop odds. 

If you really want to progress, check some advanced stuff like GTO Poker Strategy. Here is a brief intro: https://www.pokerstarsschool.com/strategies/an-introduction-to-gto-poker-strategy/1711/

it definitely applies to poker. what that odds calculator is showing is the actual probability of winning at showdown---in other words, it assumes neither player folds and the hand plays through to the river.

when this hand is run thousands and thousands of times, it roughly boils down to a 60/40 flip every single time:



if you are consistently playing 60/40 favorites in a cash game setting, then you will profit over the long run.


yes, we also need to incorporate things like fold equity and pot odds and implied odds to get a better understanding of the complete set of probabilities at play.

but those types of odds are "next level" thinking. the most basic level to master first is showdown odds.


or the probability one of your opponents is bluffing, chasing a weak draw, or has a weaker made hand. this brings us to another "next level" concept---playing against ranges of hands rather than one specific hand.

This is a great tool, but for professional online players this is a tiny fraction of the tools that are required. The most important thing is information about opponents - statistics of their behavior in different situations. Such statistics are collected by third-party programs and access to their database costs money (as far as I know in the form of a paid subscription).

Odds are one thing, but poker is much more. In poker, you don't play against odds, you play against other people, who can be very unpredictable! More than odds you need to respect blinds and how other people play specific hands, with specific cards... and man believe me if you wish to survive in long run you need to go against the odds, and you will have to do that many times!
I wrote about it here, in poker in 90% (more or less) you don't have a showdown! After playing many hands you realize it's not what cards you have, it's about how will you play and what you show with your chips!

This tool, and any tool like such, will only benefit its users long term.

If you know you have the advantage in odds and manage your raises accordingly, long term you're bound to win more. But most online competitive platforms take measures to prevent external assistance for players. And the format for online games is paced in such a way that it's not very easy to input all the data. If you're found too, then you might be banned. So these bots might be good to use if someone uses a bot that can also take in all the data automatically from competitive tables and run it long term. Not sure which platforms would allow it. But otherwise it's just an interesting experiment.

I'm afraid it may not be applicable to poker. As a matter of fact, I don't even think this kind of odds calculator is reflecting your hand's real winning probability.

If this tool would include in its winning probability calculation the cards of your opponents, the number of times your opponent is raising his/her bet, the amount raised, whether or not he/she is going all in, and so on, then it would be more or less sophisticated and kind of reliable. But if what it only does is measure your own hand's strength, I don't think you can rely on it.

After all, back to the OP's image, the probability that one of your opponents is having a royal flush is there; the probability that one of your opponents is having a straight flush is there; the probability that one of your opponents is having a four-of-a-kind is also there. And what you have is only Full house.  

I would. If the tool is a good one and it calculates percentage properly I would always call at such odds. 60% is too good to miss out. I will win 6 out of 10 times. Why not?

Of course we have to give amounts too. $10 buy in I do not blink,,, $1000?

you can't rely on anything that is chance-based. i will say though, although 60/40 flips are high variance (you will win many and also lose many) they are profitable in the long run. in cash games you can get your chips in all day with those odds.

Sometimes you can win using that calculator but there are also times that it will lead you to lose. In poker, it is not just the cards your are playing with, you should also know what other players hand. If you are greed to call because this odds calculate 60% chance of winning, you may turn down when you see that your opponent have a great cards. Yes, we can use this but don`t be dependent your game in calculator. We have our own guts in playing, we just need to believe in ourselves.

At least, the new people can learn how to match the cards with the tools to know what they need to do if they have those cards. Perhaps, they can improve their skills in poker games, and they will have more experience, so that can help them to against more poker players to get more experience. I am sure that if they can learn from those tools, they will have more strategies that will be useful for them in every poker game. And who knows, if they can improve their skills, they can be a new pro poker player, and they will more chance to win the poker tournaments.

We should try to do many things to become a pro poker player if that is our dream, and we should not give up before we succeed to reach the goals.

Very far from being a perfect tool. Well, it somehow measures how strong your hand is but then it is not something that will act as your perfect guide even in a single round. After all, it is poker. And that tool does not have any idea as to your opponents' cards. The tool does not predict either.

From the OP's image, your 59.4% winning probability vs. your opponents' 40.6% may not actually end up in your favor. You should never ever rely on it.

If, for example, somebody would all in, would you call given that your winning chance as per the tool is 59.4%? To be frank, I won't. I won't be absolutely trusting my pair of Kings in this case. It could easily be defeated with a pair of 9s or a seemingly very weak hand as a 10-diamond and 2-heart.

I never thought that there's a tool like this that can able to calculate possible on hand results.

Poker is a very tricky game for me, it might require players in good analyzing, both the cards on hand and the opponent's mind. I believed that a poker player is good in mind reading but sometimes bluffing might become harder for you to think the opponent's possible combination of cards.

How this bot gives a perfect result in having decisions like when you will decide to fold or place bet more and thinking that you have better odds.

My thought, the tool is useless as per OP's experience.  There is no way we can predict the outcome of the poker session with this kind of calculator.  We can't just calculate the possibility by just the cards on the hand.  People have this thing called strategy, and that automatically nullifies the effectiveness of the calculated possibility of that calculator.

it's really not for use at the table---more so for reviewing hands afterwards.

when difficult spots come up, it's important to analyze them after the fact, determine your opponents' ranges, and run the odds so that you better understand where you stand next time.

once you get simple odds down (made hands, draws) then you can start incorporating things like pot odds, fold equity, ICM, etc to get a more complete view of the probabilities at play. poker is all about extracting value in EV+ situations when your opponents are gambling with bad odds.

I expect that anyone that play online poker is definitely not a 'beginner' anymore because it involves some money unless of course it is some freeroll. I refer this to a total beginner that dont know a full house is higher than a straight or a flush, complete total 'beginner'. Assuming that you are a higher level than the 'beginner' stage and you choose to use this, Imagine how hard would it be to concentrate while using this

This could be good to use at post game review when you want to review your chances on specific round but again there is better calculator out there

many factors can affect your game or on this game because this game is a mix of skill and luck  so fully reallying on this tool isnt really a good idea but odd calculator can only give you an overview or an estimation if what are the odds you can get on the game that your trying to play    .

 this tool is cool because its only specific for poker , this gives more better accuracy than compare to the general odd calculator that some gambling site provide  so still thank you this

Uhhh...I think this built for educational purposes for learning the game and helping you to see every possible scenario. Kinda great practicing your poker skill while you're off the table.

It's a great tool for starters when you're trying to learn the game, but the tool is not applicable in a live game.

This seems like a great tool for beginners to get better in poker. But once you play for a while you will be familiar with your calling and betting ranges. Eventually you know by heart from which positions you can play which cards.

To find any mistakes in your game it should be a good tool. In the end having a slightly higher winning rate might be nice, but if you can play 2 more tables at the same time with a little bit lower winnings but therefore more winnings. It's better to increase your numbers of tables you can play at once.

Don't forget there is a huge variance in poker involved. It might takes thousands of hands to actually see your higher winning rates.

Yes you can use this even you are playing online and live poker games as it only requires a user input on what is currently your cards that you hold and the cards on the table. It only calculates the odds but there are a lot of possibilities in playing card games especially poker most especially if the players are more than 5, hence, accuracy is too blurry even with less players, the chances of their cards is too random, better call it luck if you followed the tool and still win.


Indeed. It's like pausing the game and just input all the necessary fields in the tool yet only calculates the possibilities but with no certainty. I've tried it but even if you input so many random numbers and tried it so many times, the chances remains 50-50 and your winning is either a 100% or 0%. LOL

I think that this is a good tool or nice to have while you are playing as it can give you some guidance as to whether what to do next.For professional level players this maybe not the perfect tool but I think having a calculator right next to your screen while playing can be a good indicator of what to do next.For example when I am in doubt if to go all in or not this calculator can give me a small hint.

Pretty much you can not use that in an actual game but it is kind of neat for an online match because certainly the application can see both hands, but it is not really that needed when playing your way out and you had the skill in winning a poker game, but for some newbies in the poker gamblig it will surely help them with making decisions if the calculator is applicable in that certain online poker game that they are playing which is most of the time they don't really have calculator like this.

I really can't see myself sitting in a Casino and blurting out "Hang on people, I'll just check the odds of these two cards against the app in my pocket."

It *might* help you playing online, but I've seen Texas Hold Em can get pretty quick, so by the time you've entered details it's back to your turn again and everyone is waiting.

As an educational tool for someone starting out it could be ok, but people should familiarise themselves with the odds in play ahead of game day.

The beginners need to have basic knowledge of poker games, but with that additional tools, they will have a chance to improve their skills, and maybe they will know how to bluff the opponent. Maybe that will not work if the opponent is a master in the poker games, but if they can play among the beginner, that will help them to win. The experience poker games can also improve their skills by knowing how to bluff the opponent on the table.

Awesome this will help me as I often might miss a possibility, I've only been playing vs friends on a friendly platform type game but I do think its good for people coming into the game.   A crutch is not a good idea in the long term but this could also be good for underlining the rules and this idea of contrasting your hand vs other possibles.
  As far as the OP bet goes I'd take take that risk as you wont often get full house but its a bit unfortunate in being a very rare straight flush there for anyone to take, at least the risk is clear not hidden.    Take the gamble seems profitable to me, try to avoid over stating your hand is how I'd go with that.   40% risk is too much to go all in but we cant say sitting here on the thread as people give extra clues in their behaviour at the time and judging the confidence they have etc.    If they were confident early on then you are good to go ahead as only on the river did you get your pay off thats unlikely to be beaten, unfortunately that also occurred for the straight flush.

Not really helping.

They still have some scenario someone has 9 Four Of King since on the table we have 9 Pair, this tools just make you confident doing all in then you got a trap with that's just because seeing the percentage of your winning rate.

You got a point though but i can see that this one would really be beneficial for noobs.This might not really give out much knowledge but they would able to grasp everything when they do gain experience.

Sooner or later they will realize that this wont really be enough and they should take proper card handling to increase their odds which cant really be shown by this Tool.

Its a relevant one but we know that winning Poker does really need several factors too.

I disagree with the idea that this tool is good for beginners.

Instead of feeding their mind with proper basic knowledge, they will be getting used to using that tool to assist them in each of their session. Let these beginners squeezed their minds in order to win with their own skills as their foundation and reference.

That tool is way better to use by experienced ones as that will act as their additional reference alongside their own knowledge and skills about dealing with their opponents on the table.

this is where ranges come in. very seldom will you be able to read the exact hand your opponent is holding. usually you are playing against a range of possible hands, including the nuts, weaker made hands, draws, and pure bluffs.

a next level odds calculator i recommend is pokerstove: https://www.cardschat.com/poker-stove.php

it allows you to incorporate things like hand ranges, opponents with random hands, etc and is free.

It could help you to be better only if you are new on this, otherwise it wont really help anything


This calculator , calculate the chances for you to win with your respective cards against the other. Even if someone bluff, as long as you correctly input your card into that calculator then it will show you the chances

In the OP thread picture, there is a possiblity for a flush which loses against Full house at 48.21% however another possibility for Straight Flush at 40%. Knowing this chances, someone could easily take measurement not to raise too high as 40% chances to lose is quite high

So even if someone tried to bluff, you know their chances to beat you is around 40% with this calculator so you can either go for it or fold


would be hard to use this while concentrating on the game

^ All of you are definitely right, I realize that this calculator is good for beginners that did not know the correct handling of cards and which combination could defeat your opponent. Probably it could help you to master the poker game but not for instance that you can depend on this calculator algorithm all along. Nevertheless, a bluff from opponents that pretend has a better hand will have an impact in every decision you have. The calculator probably gives a percentage of your winning but it could not read a bluff fro your opponents.
^ I already did this, sometime it will give accurate result but there are instances I made a wrong decision.

It will only be beneficial if you are trying out poker and learning the game. But against a real-life, money-at-stake setting, I doubt that it will be even useful especially on instances that a quick decision is needed. Poker isn't as easy as making an algorithm and letting the computer do the work; there are tons of factors that come to play when dealing with other people's hands. Luck also comes to play aside from being the better Nostradamus of all the players in the table. Most of the time you will be dealt with a shitton of useless cards and your opponent has the godly full house or whatever winning hand that could be, and you just have to guess when to back out or pull a bluff and win, and I don't think this tool would even know that. But yeah, for reviewing matches and learning the ropes of poker, this could be useful for a beginner, but not on the pro scene.

It's definitely helpful when you are still learning the game and also while mastering the game, you would always want to come back to such a calculator to do some hand reviews and improve your game.

But as you found out yourself with this.....


......the real difficulty with Poker lies in guessing and anticipating what your opponent(s) hold. And this is the biggest part. If you mastered to read your opponents on any level, you will be successful in Poker. Why ? Because most of the times you won't have the nuts, full house, a flush or trips, but one pair, two pair or even nothing. And when you have some kind of a hand, but there could be a shitload of better hands, that is where the problems start. If you are good at reading your opponent, you will be able to make good/valuable decisions and money as a result. And an odds calculator can't help you with that unfortunately There is some software that can assist you with analyzing your opponents, but there is a big human factor, which all players have to work on themselves.

I kindda say, this is beneficial for online gambling, but if you are playing poker in physical casino with live players, most of the time, the best of the best have a very good experience in memorizing the cards as it gives you the advantage to somehow guess with higher accuracy than just reading your opponent's mind and facial expression.

I just wonder if you could apply this tool especially when you are playing live in online poker games? For example, opening this tool on the other tab or monitor. If so, you are in a great advantage.

Maybe that will be a perfect tool for the beginner, but for the veteran or pro poker player, they don't need the calculator because they know what it needs. However, as it is written on the quote, it can help every poker player know how big their chance to win the games. I wish I know these games much because I feel that it is difficult for me to understand the poker games

You heard it right, there is a tool that can calculate the odds of poker game and know your chances of winning.
I took a snapshot when tried to test how accurate it is but I saw that it will remain unpredictable against the odds of your opponent.
But have a try first before you will share your thought and probably it will works on you.


https://www.pokernews.com/poker-tools/poker-odds-calculator.htm
^ Nevertheless, let us discuss and share your thought!