Poker is a card game in which players try to form a hand of cards that will win against the other players. The winning hand is determined by a combination of luck and skill.

In a standard poker game, each player “buys in” by purchasing a number of chips and then placing those chips into a central pot. These chips represent money and are usually red, white, black, blue, or green in color. The dealer assigns values to the chips prior to the start of the game, and the player exchanges cash for the appropriate amount of chips.

There are many variants of poker. Some are more complicated than others, and they may differ in rules regarding forced bets (such as the ante) or the way players may develop their hands.

The Deal

In each betting interval, a player is dealt one or more cards face down. They can then see those cards, and must either call the bet made by the player to their left; raise the bet, by putting into the pot more than enough chips to call the bet; or drop out of the betting interval, by removing all chips from the pot and discarding their hand.

The Showdown

After the cards are revealed, each player must show their hands and the player with the highest hand wins. If two or more players have equal hands, the winnings are divided among them according to the rules of the particular variant.