Calculating Texas Holdem Odds

This article is mainly for people who already know how to play Texas Holdem and who are looking to better their game. If you are a beginner I would recommend first reading my 'How to play Texas holdem' article.

So what is odds calculating in Texas Hodelm? If you've been playing this game you've probably bumped into this phrase at least once. Texas Holdem odds calculation is determining your winning odds based on the communal cards which are placed open and the other players' battings in each round.

A combination of these two gives a player a pretty good idea of whether to fold, match or even raise. This is the main reason why Texas Holdem is the most popular poker game there is. Because of the way the game is played the luck facture is minimized and brains and experience are playing a big part.

I will present here only the basic principles of Texas Holdem. If you would like more elaborated information you are welcome to visit my Texas Holdem site. The information is available in English and Hungarian and you can find there everything you need to know about Texas Holdem.

So let's start with the easy part - Pot odds:
Pot odds means how much you can win for what you need to put in your self. For example, if you can win 10$ for 2$ you need to put then your odds are 2 to 10 and this is considered as a good pot odd.

But how do you calculate your pot odds? Calculate the gambling sum that is already on the table. Add the amount of money you predict the other players are going to put in this round,(after you put your own bet), take this sum and divide it by the amount of money you will have to put in if you want to match the other players betting. Take under consideration that the odds are changing each time there's a new round.

The next thing you need to know is how to calculate Outs. Outs are every card in the pack that we can't see and it is considered as a possible option.

Example - you have a King and an Ace. There are all together four kings and four Aces in a pack of cards. If you've seen two it means that there are 6 potential others in the pack that can complete you hand into a winning one. Since there are 47 cards left in the pack you have 6/47 chances of getting each of these cards which means you have about 19% chance of winning and your opponents has, all together, 80% of winning.

This is just one easy example for elaborated hand combination possibilities. The main idea is to see what you have, think about what you are missing for getting a good winning hand and calculating your odds of getting these cards while relaying on the open cards on the table.

For those of you who are beginners in this I strongly recommend using a premade Texas holdem odds calculation table. Don't be tempted to use the full automatic odds calculator since you're not going to learn how to calculating your odds very well in this way.

Remember, using an auto calculator may help you when playing Texas Holdem online, but it will not help you when playing against your poker buddies or someday in your first WSOP tournament.