Jacks or Better Video Poker

Jacks or Better is a popular version of draw poker that has enjoyed a resurgence thanks to the advent of video poker and online casinos. It is often credited as the oldest standard in video poker, and its simplicity and straight forward nature allowed this new format to really take off. The game hasn’t changed much over the years outside of casinos adjusting the pay table depending on where you play.

Draw poker is the simplest version of the game, and Jacks or Better grows on the concept by allowing players to essentially hunt for certain hands. Five cards are dealt out, and then players are allowed to discard cards and replace them with fresh ones off the top of the deck. Players are usually only allowed one round of exchanges.

Below is a description of the general payouts for each hand in Jacks or Better. Most tables employ either a 9/6 or 8/5 payout table. These are 8/5 payout rules (the “8” refers to the payout of the Full House, while the “5” refers to the Flush. A 9/6 Jacks or Better game would have different values for those hands, while the other hands generally stays the same.)

It’s also worth noting that video poker uses a betting system that involves using anywhere from 1 to 5 coins. The more coins you use per hand, the higher your reward is. Using 5 coins, or a “max bet”, is usually the only way of triggering bonuses associated with big winning hands.

Royal Flush (800 to 1) – All cards are share the same suit and are in specific order from 10 thru A.

Straight Flush (50 to 1) – All cards share the same suit and are in numerical order. Examples are 2,3,4,5,6 all same suit or 9,10,J,Q,K all suited.

Four of a Kind (25 to 1) – Four cards that all share the same rank.

Full House (8 to 1) – A full house is a combination of three-of-a-kind and a pair. In the instance that a player has triple 8’s and a pair of 4’s, you would say that you have “8’s full of 4’s”.

Flush (5 to 1) – All five cards share the same suit. They do not have to be in sequential order.

Straight (4 to 1) – Cards are in sequential order according to rank. They do not need to be of the same suit.

Three of a Kind (3 to 1) – Three cards have identical face value.

Two Pair (2 to 1) – Two sets of pairs in the same hand.

Pair (1 to 1) – Two cards that have identical face value. In Jacks or Better, the minimum hand that you must have is a pair of Jacks to win this bet.