Online Video Poker Guide
Overview
Video poker is a five-card draw and played in either online casinos or on terminals similar to slot machines in physical casinos. Video Poker is the common name for a fixed-odds poker game based on. In 1970 Dale Electronics introduced the world’s first video poker machine.
Rules of Video Poker:
Video poker has many variants, but all are based on one of poker’s simplest varieties, five-card draw.
The player is dealt a five-card poker hand, then given one opportunity to keep the cards they wish to keep and discard the ones they don’t wish to retain, receiving new cards in return. This then makes up their final hand.
Below is a simple step-by-step Online Video Poker Guide:
- Deposit credit into the video poker machine
- Make your bet
- Hit deal to receive your initial five-card poker hand
- Discard cards you don’t deem useful (up to all five can be discarded)
- Receive replacement cards from the same virtual deck’.
- Any winnings are paid out according to the paytable.
How to place a bet:
Players have the option of betting from one coin up to five coins in a single-hand video poker game. You’ll get the highest return when you play max coins (i.e., five coins); however, for some players, it makes sense to play only one coin.
Payables explained
| Winning Hand | 1 Coin | 2 Coins | 3 Coins | 4 Coins | 5 Coins |
| Royal Flush | 250 | 500 | 750 | 1000 | 4000 |
| Straight Flush | 50 | 100 | 150 | 200 | 250 |
| Four of a Kind | 25 | 50 | 75 | 100 | 125 |
| Full House | 9 | 18 | 27 | 36 | 45 |
| Flush | 6 | 12 | 18 | 24 | 30 |
| Straight | 4 | 8 | 12 | 16 | 20 |
| Three of a Kind | 3 | 6 | 9 | 12 | 15 |
| Two Pair | 2 | 4 | 6 | 8 | 10 |
| Jacks or Better | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
General rules of Video Poker
- It never makes any sense to bet two, three, or four coins in a five-coin game because you risk more money with no increase in expected return.
- You’ll get the maximum return from any video poker game when you bet enough to get the bonus payoff for the royal flush.
- If you aren’t comfortable betting maximum coins at a specific denomination machine, try finding a lower denomination machine that has the same game with the same return (or another game with a similar return) and play the lower denomination machine for maximum coins.
- If you decide to play a single-coin, you can boost your return by adjusting your playing strategy. For example, holding two-card royal flushes is often the right play when you wager five coins, but with a one-coin bet, it’s not always the best hold.
- If you have the edge when you play, you should never play less than max coins