Three Card Poker is a casino table game in which you and the dealer each receive three cards and the better hand wins. It is quick to learn, and you make only one real decision per round. You can practise it at the free shared table further down this page before you read the odds or play for money anywhere.
Play Online Three Card Poker
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What Three Card Poker is
The game is played against the house, never against other players. You sit at a table with a standard 52-card deck, and each round has two main wagers, which you may place together or separately. Ante and Play is a head-to-head contest with the dealer. Pair Plus is a side bet that pays on the strength of your own three cards and ignores the dealer’s hand. Many tables also offer a third wager, the 6-Card Bonus, described below.
Because only three cards are in play, the hand ranking differs from five-card poker. Here is the order, from highest to lowest: straight flush, three of a kind, straight, flush, pair, high card. A straight beats a flush, because straights are less common with three cards.
How to play, step by step
- Place an Ante bet, a Pair Plus bet, or both. If you want the 6-Card Bonus, place that too.
- You and the dealer each receive three cards. Yours are visible to you, and the dealer’s stay face down.
- Look at your hand and decide. You can fold and lose the Ante, or you can make a Play bet equal to the Ante.
- The dealer turns over three cards. The dealer needs queen-high or better to qualify.
- If the dealer does not qualify, the Ante pays 1:1 and the Play bet is returned.
- If the dealer qualifies, the higher hand wins and both the Ante and the Play bet pay 1:1. A lower hand loses both bets, and an equal hand pushes.
- Independently of the result, a straight or better earns the Ante bonus, and Pair Plus is settled from your hand alone.
Pair Plus is settled even if you fold the main hand. The 6-Card Bonus, where offered, combines your three cards with the dealer’s three and pays on the best five-card hand among the six.
Paytable
The paytables below are the ones used on our free-play table. Casinos vary, and the differences matter, so always read the one posted at the table you sit down at.
| Hand | Ante bonus | Pair Plus | 6-Card Bonus |
|---|---|---|---|
| Royal flush (six cards) | – | – | 1000:1 |
| Straight flush | 5:1 | 40:1 | 200:1 |
| Four of a kind | – | – | 100:1 |
| Three of a kind | 4:1 | 30:1 | 7:1 |
| Full house | – | – | 20:1 |
| Flush | – | 3:1 | 15:1 |
| Straight | 1:1 | 6:1 | 10:1 |
| Pair | – | 1:1 | – |
Ante and Play bets pay 1:1 when you win the hand, and the dealer qualifies with queen-high or better.
Odds and house edge
There are 22,100 possible three-card hands. The chance of each hand, according to Wizard of Odds, is roughly: straight flush 0.22%, three of a kind 0.24%, straight 3.26%, flush 4.96%, pair 16.94%, and high card 74.39%.
| Bet | House edge |
|---|---|
| Ante and Play (with the Ante bonus above) | 3.37% |
| Pair Plus (flush paying 3:1) | 7.28% |
| 6-Card Bonus (paytable above) | 8.56% |
The Ante and Play figure assumes the strategy below. The 8.56% for the 6-Card Bonus is our own calculation, made by counting all 20,358,520 six-card combinations against this paytable. Wizard of Odds notes that Pair Plus drops to 2.32% on a paytable where a flush pays 4:1, so a single number on the table can change the value of the bet considerably. Over many rounds the house edge is the average share of your original stake that you should expect to lose, not a prediction for one session.
Strategy
The Ante and Play decision has a simple rule. Raise with queen-6-4 or better, and fold anything lower. Hands are compared card by card from the highest, so queen-6-4 beats queen-6-3, and any hand with a king or an ace high is a raise. Practically, you raise with any queen-high hand whose second card is a 7 or higher, and with queen-6 if the third card is a 4 or higher. You fold queen-6-3 and lower, as well as queen-5 and lower.
Wizard of Odds reports that this rule is the same whichever Ante bonus paytable a table uses. Copying the dealer, by raising on anything queen-high or better, costs a little more (3.45%), and raising every hand costs 7.65%. The side bets have no skill element. Pair Plus and the 6-Card Bonus are decided entirely by the cards, and both carry a larger house edge than the main bet, so many players leave them out.
Playing online
Online versions vary in rules and side bets, so check the paytable before you deposit. Our game database lists Three Card Poker titles from Games Global (the studio formerly known as Microgaming), including 3 Card Poker, 3 Card Poker Gold and a multi-hand version, as well as versions from Amaya, Rival and 1x2gaming. We do not currently list a Playtech Three Card Poker title. Live-dealer versions also exist at some casinos, and the speed of play and any side bets differ from the software games. The bets and house edges on this page apply only when a game uses these paytables, so confirm each one in the game’s help screen. If you would like to compare the format with another casino poker game, see our Pai Gow Poker guide.
Only gamble if you are of legal age where you live, and set a limit before you start.
Sources
- Wizard of Odds, Three Card Poker: rules, hand probabilities, Ante and Pair Plus house edges and strategy
- Casino News Daily calculation of the 6-Card Bonus house edge for the paytable shown (all 20,358,520 six-card combinations)
- Casino News Daily game database (software providers)
