Familiarize Yourself with Texas Holdem

Texas Hold’em is one of the most popular games that are played all around the world and in order to enjoy it, you need to familiarize yourself with the rules of the Texas Hold’em.

Some key terms are used while playing the game and during the articles and so, it’s advisable to go through the rules and the key terms in the first place in order to understand Texas Hold’em clearly.

The Blinds

A circular disc called as ‘the button’ is used to indicate the person who is acting as the dealer for the current game. The person next to the dealer in the clockwise direction is known as the ‘small blind’ and the person next to the small blind in the clockwise direction is known as the ‘big blind’.

Players receive two hole cards after the initial half a small bet and the full small bet have been posted by the blinds.

The Pre-Flop

Once the players have seen their pocket cards, they’ve the option to play their hand by raising or by calling the big blind as call or raise are the only actions available in Texas Hold’em after the first player has played his turn. However, each player also has the option to fold and the first player to act has the option to bet along with call and raise.

The subsequent players only have the option to call or raise. If you’re wondering what’s a call or a raise then a call is to bet the same amount as the previous bet and to raise is to match the previous bet and increase the bet to new value.

The Flop

The first three community poker cards available to all the active players i.e. to the players still in the hand are known as ‘flop’. These three cards are dealt face-up on the board and the person immediately clockwise to the dealer starts the betting. All the raises and bets occur in small bets.

The Turn

The fourth community card in Texas Hold’em is known as ‘turn’. The turn is dealt face-up once the betting for the flop round is over. In the new round, the player immediately clockwise to the dealer starts the betting and the betting is doubled from the small bet to the big bet.

The River

The final community card in Texas Hold’em is known as ‘river’. Once the betting is over for the turn round, the river is dealt face-up on the board. The process used for betting in this round is same as that of the one used for the betting process of the turn round.

The Showdown

If more than one poker player remains after the final betting round, the last raiser or bettor show his cards first and if there was no bet during the final round then the player immediately clockwise to the dealer shows his cards first.

The player with the best hand wins the Texas Hold’em pot and if there are people with identical hands then the pot is shared equally between them.

Once the pot is awarded to the winner, the button moves clockwise i.e. the dealer and the blinds change and new hands are dealt to each player so as to begin a new game of Texas Hold’em.