Poker is a card game that involves betting among players. The highest hand wins the pot. In addition to skill, a good poker player also needs a little bit of luck.
To start a hand of poker, each player puts in an amount of money, called chips, into the pot. This is known as placing the ante. This can happen before the dealer deals each player his or her cards or afterward. In some poker variants, the ante is not required, but there are still rules for who must place chips into the pot.
Before the ante is placed, each player is dealt two cards face-down (hidden from other players). These are called that player’s hole or pocket cards. Then a betting phase begins with the player to the left of the big blind, as determined by the rules of the game being played. After the first betting interval, 3 cards are dealt face-up in the center of the table, known as the flop. These are community cards that each player can use to make a 5-card hand.
The highest hand in a poker game is a royal flush, which consists of 4 matching cards of one rank and 5 consecutive cards of the same suit. The next highest is a straight, which consists of 5 consecutive cards in the same suit but may skip around in rank. The lowest hand is a pair, which consists of two distinct cards of the same rank. The highest pair breaks ties.