When you have just started playing poker the language of the game may sound foreign to you. Phrases like Blinds, Buy-in or even Call or Check may be intimidating. That’s why before you start your playing adventures you must make sure that poker terms and phrases are not foreign to you. That’s why reading this Poker terms and terminology article is so important. So read all the terms, memorize them and only once you are 100% comfortable with them, move on with your game.
Action – the process of betting.
American Airlines – a pair of Aces.
Ante – a small amount of money entered into the pot during games of Stud. It is not required in the more popular versions of Hold’em.
Bad Beat – when luck intervenes to allow a bad hand to beat a good hand.
Blinds – forced bets to encourage betting for each hand.
Bluff – placing a bet when you do not think your hand is strong enough to win, instead hoping to trick the other players into thinking you have a stronger hand in an effort to win the hand.
Broadway – an Ace high straight hand.
Button – a dealer button that is passed around the table with each hand from player to player to technically indicate who is dealt their cards first.
Buy-In – the minimum amount of money required to enter a game of poker.
Call – this is when the player matches a bet that has been made.
Check – a term used for when the player wishes to stick with their previous bet and not add any more money to it.
Cowboys – a pair of Kings.
Ducks – a pair of twos.
Flop – these are the first three community cards in Texas Hold’em Poker and Omaha Hold’em.
Flush – when all the cards in the hand are of the same suit. Consult the Poker Hand Rankings page for the full list of hands.
Fold – withdraw from the hand.
Four of a Kind – also known as Quads, when four cards are of the same value in the same hand e.g. Q,Q,Q,Q,5.
Freerolls: free online poker tournaments.
Hole Cards – these are the personal cards that are dealt face down and can only be viewed by the player who gets them.
Ladies – a pair of Queens.
Monster – when a player possesses a very big hand.
Multi Table Tournaments: mainstream online tournaments. Tournament starts in a specific time. Each player gets a fixed amount of chips. Players are eliminated when they run out of chips and the winner of the tournament is the players who is not eliminated in this way.
Nuts – the strongest possible hand at the table.
Pair – two cards that are the same.
Pocket Rockets – when a player’s hole cards are two Aces.
Pot – the sum of money in the middle of the table where all bets during a hand are placed. The winner of a hand wins the pot.
Raise: when a player increases the bet size in a hand.
River – the final community card dealt on the table in Hold’em. Also referred to as the Fifth Street.
Royal Flush – a hand consisting of an Ace, King, Queen Jack and 10 from the same suit.
Satellite – a smaller qualifying tournament that allows potential access into the larger tournaments.
Straight – when the cards in the hand run in line e.g. 2,3,4,5,6, but with different suits.
Straight Flush – five consecutive cards that are from the same suit.
Trips – also known as Three of a Kind when three cards are of the same value in the same hand.
Turn – the fourth community card dealt on the table in Hold’em. Also referred to as Fourth Street.
WSOP – World Series of Poker. The biggest and most popular live poker tournament
