Poker Hands Rated from Best to Worst

A royal flush is a straight from a ten to an ace of the same suit. It’s important to remember that in poker, all suits are ranked equally.

A straight flush is any five-card straight in any suit. A lot of players question whether or not a straight beats a flush. The answer to this is no, but straight-flush beats both a straight and a flush.

A four of a kind is any four cards of the same rank, plus a “kicker”(a fifth card) that decides who wins the pot.

To have a full house, you must have any three cards of the same rank plus any two cards of the same rank. In the example above, you can see we’ve got “Sevens full of Aces” which is a better hand than “Aces full of Sevens”.

To have a flush, you require any five cards of the same suit and they are not necessarily in sequence. In the above example, you see an Ace-high flush which is the highest flush you can get.

In the picture above, you can see we have a five-high straight, which is the highest possible straight. The ace can either act as a high card or a low card in a straight, and straights are made up of any five consecutive straights. They are not necessarily from the suit either.

A three of a kind is any three cards of the same rank. The example we’ve provided above shows three-of-a-kind aces, with the King and Queen as the side cards—this is the best possible three of a kind.

In order to have a two-pair hand, you must have any two cards of the same rank together with any other two cards of the same rank. The highest pair of the two, determines the rank of the two-pair.

For a one-pair hand, you need any one pair of the same rank. The best possible on-pair hand would be two aces and a King, Queen, and a Jack (not necessarily in the same suit).

A high card hand can be any hand not mentioned in any of the hands above. Our example above shows you the highest high-card hand possible.