No stupid questions: What is equity in poker
More from our beginner series and today we look at the crucial concept of how strong your hand is.
Most people are introduced to the concept of equity in poker when they first see an all-in and a call on TV.
The percentage under each players hand is their equity? Most people understand that it relates to their chances of winning, but what does it mean?
Equity refers to how often your hand will win if it gets to showdown.
Equity = showdown
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The showdown part is the most crucial consideration. When a hand is all-in and called, it will get to showdown. If a hand is checked down, it will get to showdown. If a player bets and their opponent calls every street, it will get to showdown.
However, if either player folds, equity is moot.
But because poker is a game where we can make other players fold, equity is not the be-all and end-all. There are other concepts we will discuss such as EV and equity realisation in a future article.
Going back to how equity works, it relates to the hand before the river. On the river one player will have 100% equity and the other will have 0% equity. This is because there are no more cards to come that could improve either player.
The promise of cards to come is what determines your equity.
The promise of more cards to come
The classic example is when one player has a hand like A♣K♣ and the other has 9♣9♥. In that match-up, A♣K♣ has 47.01% equity and 9♣9♥ has 52.54% equity. The odds are really close and it is referred to as a coinflip.
The A♣K♣ is behind but has five cards (flop, turn and river) to hit either an Ace, a King, three clubs, three consecutive cards for a straight, two high cards pairing on the flop (ie. TTQQ) or four cards making quads. All while avoiding another nine being dealt or the board bringing trips to give 99 a full house. The odds of one of those things happening is 47.01%. The odds of the 9♣9♥ avoiding all of that is 52.54%.
There is also a 0.9% chance the board bring five consecutive cards to make a straight, flush or quads with an Ace kicker, which would mean both players split the pot.
If a hand has more than 50% equity, that would mean it is a profitable 'value hand', ie. one you want to get to showdown most of the time.
Range vs Range
Not only can we identify the equity a specific hand has against another specific hand, we can also measure the equity that hand has against a whole range of possible cards your opponent may have. Or indeed, the equity of one range of hands against another range.
For example, if you had 88 and you put your opponent on a range of 55+,A2s+,KJs+,QJs,AJo+,KQo. You have 51.16% equity against that range. Some of the hands in that range crush 88, but overall it performs well.
The best way to learn about equity is with the free PokerStrategy.com tool Equilab. You can play around with hand match-ups and range match-ups, and learn by trial and error.
Do you understand the concept of equity? Let us know in the comments:
