If you are looking for easy-to-remember and quick poker tips that will help you devise a poker strategy and win at No-Limit Hold ‘em, you’re in luck!
We’ve compiled seven poker strategies that will make you a more confident and profitable poker player.
- Best Poker Strategy
- Tip #1: Play Fewer Hands and Play Aggressively
- Tip #2: Do Not Be the First Player to Limp
- Tip #3: Semi-Bluff Aggressively with Your Draw
- Tip #4: Quickly Play Your Strong Hands to Build the Pot and Make More Money
- Tip #5: Fold When You are Unsure
- Tip #6: Attack When Your Opponent Shows Weakness
- Tip #7: Only Play If You Feel Like Playing
Best Poker Strategy
This list will not teach you how to win at poker every time – not even the greatest of poker players do that – but this guide will help you improve at the game.
Whether you play cash games, tournaments, or in live poker rooms, we will help you maximise your profit.
Poker Strategy Tip #1: Play Fewer Hands and Play Aggressively
Most tables have a limit on how many starting hands you can play before the flop in No-Limit Texas Hold ’em, even for the world’s greatest players. If you play too many hands, you will slowly bleed away your chip stack.
Developing a solid pre-flop poker strategy is the easiest and fastest way to improve your bottom-line profit. However, while developing a solid pre-flop strategy is relatively easy to do, having the discipline to stick to it is difficult. Do not allow yourself to become impatient quickly and play a hand that is not worth playing.
The greatest approach is to play a tight range of strong and/or playable hands, and you need to play those hands aggressively.
When you raise, your opponents will not know whether you have A-A, A-K, or 7-6, which makes you super tough to play against. Tight and aggressive wins the game!
Poker Strategy Tip #2: Do Not Be the First Player to Limp
To limp is an avoid-at-all-costs mistake as the first player to enter into the pot. There are two reasons why this play needs to be avoided:
- You cannot win the prize pot before the flop as if you had raised.
- You give the other players behind enticing pot odds, making it more likely that you will face multiple players, making it less likely you win the pot.
The only situation in which you should limp is when one other player has already limped. Called over-limping, it can be a great play because you are getting great odds to join the action so that you can hit something good on the flop.
Tip #3: Semi-Bluff Aggressively with Your Draw
If you want to crush poker truly, you need to bluff effectively. Bluffing ineffectively is actually one of the fastest ways to lose your money at the poker table. So, how do you keep your bluffing under control?
The best way to bluff is to let the cards dictate if you are going to bluff. This means that you should bluff with hands that have opportunities to improve to the best hand, such as a straight draw, a flush draw, or just an overcard or two to the board.
Tip #4: Quickly Play Your Strong Hands to Build the Pot and Make More Money
It is a sad sight when a player checks their flopped nut flush three times, and then must awkwardly table their monster of a poker hand when their opponent checks back the river. Slow playing is a mistake common among players who are wary of chasing their opponents out of the pot when they have a strong poker hand.
In most cases, it is best to bet your strong hands to build the pot and protect your equity. That is not to say you should always bet/raise your strong hands post-flop. You can check your strong hands if:
- It is unlikely that you will be outdrawn.
- Your opponent’s card range is heavily weighted toward hands that have no showdown value.
Yet, when you feel uncertain, just bet (or check-raise if you were not the pre-flop aggressor). Yes, it is disappointing when your opponent folds, but that is not as disappointing as getting outdrawn or missing out on potential value.
Tip #5: Fold When You are Unsure
Want to know the most significant difference between a bad player and a professional player? The professional player can lay down a good hand like top pair when they think they are beaten.
This sounds amazingly simple, but it is tough to put into practice partly because of the way our brains are programmed. We are naturally very curious, and we naturally aim to win. When we fold, we are surrendering our chance to win the pot, and we do not get to satisfy our curiosity by learning what our opponent has.
Then calling too often and in the incorrect situations is the second fastest way to lose at the poker table (after ineffective bluffs). When you are unsure whether to call or fold versus a bet or raise, make it easy for yourself and fold.
Tip #6: Attack When Your Opponent Shows Weakness
Players do not check with a hand that can call multiple bets nearly as often as they should. This means that, when they check, they usually have a weaker hand that they would usually fold if they were faced with multiple bets. This is called the “bluffing with nothing” situation I referred to earlier.
When your opponents show a lot of weakness in a heads-up, you can easily take advantage of them with your aggressive bluffing strategy. Not only should you wager with your usual semi-bluffs, but you should also bet as a pure bluff with some sub-par hands, ideally ones with good blocker effects.
Tip #7: Only Play If You Feel Like Playing
Playing poker should be a fun experience, regardless if you are playing as a hobby or if you are a professional player. You are always going to perform at your best when you are happy, so it only makes sense that you should play this mentally intensive game when you are feeling that way.
If you feel frustration, fatigue, or some anger building up, you should just quit the session right there and then. This is one of the simplest parts of poker strategy – the ability to walk away. You are highly likely saving yourself a bunch of money by doing so. Poker will still be there tomorrow.