Video poker
Video poker is structurally one of the highest-EV games available — full-pay Jacks or Better with optimal strategy runs at 99.54% RTP, comparable to perfect blackjack. The catch: 'full-pay' variants are increasingly rare, and most casinos run reduced paytables that quietly inflate the house edge. The other catch: there's a memorizable optimal strategy chart for each variant, and most players don't use one. Played correctly on a full-pay machine, video poker is among the best games on the floor. Played casually on short-pay, it's mediocre.
How to play video poker
- 1You're dealt 5 cards from a standard 52-card deck.
- 2Choose which cards to "hold." The rest are replaced with new cards.
- 3Final hand is compared against the paytable. Pair-of-jacks-or-better is the minimum payout in Jacks or Better; better hands pay more.
- 4Full-pay Jacks or Better: full house pays 9:1, flush pays 6:1. 'Short-pay' variants pay less (e.g. 8:1 / 5:1) — significantly worse.
- 5The strategy is per-variant. Jacks or Better, Deuces Wild, Bonus Poker, etc. each have different optimal hold patterns.
What the numbers actually say
| RTP — Full-pay 9/6 Jacks or Better Among the highest-RTP games on the floor | 99.54% |
| RTP — 8/5 Jacks or Better (short-pay) 2.24 percentage points worse — significant | 97.30% |
| RTP — Full-pay Deuces Wild Theoretical positive expectation with perfect play. Almost never available. | 100.76% |
| RTP — Casual play (no strategy chart) Even on full-pay variants, casual play loses 2-3 percentage points to suboptimal holds | ~96–97% |
| Probability of dealt royal flush | 1 in 649,740 |
The rules that actually matter
Always check the paytable BEFORE sitting down
Why · Full-pay Jacks or Better (9/6) vs short-pay (8/5) is a 2.24 percentage-point swing. On $1,000 of turnover, that's $22 lost.
Use a per-variant optimal strategy chart
Why · Each video poker variant has a memorizable hold-decision chart. Jacks or Better is simplest; Deuces Wild is the most complex. Casual hold decisions cost ~2-3 percentage points.
Always hold a low pair over high cards
Why · Common mistake: discarding a pair of 4s to chase high-card pairs. Holding the pair has higher EV in nearly all situations.
Bet max coins to qualify for the bonus royal-flush payout
Why · Royal flush usually pays 250 coins for 1-coin bets but 800 coins for 5-coin bets. Bet less than max and you give up the multiplier on the rare big hit — meaningfully reduces RTP.
Common mistakes that cost real money
Our take, scored
Gamsites editorial rating · weighted aggregate combines all four dimensions · see manifesto for the rubric
Casinos with video poker
How we sourced this
RTP figures are standard video poker math derivations for stated paytables. Crypto-casino video poker is generally RNG-based with paytable variants matching land-based equivalents.
Video poker questions, answered
What is the house edge in video poker?+
With optimal strategy, Video poker carries a house edge of ~0.5% (full-pay variants, optimal play). Typical (non-optimal) play runs at ~3–5% (suboptimal play or short-pay variants). The gap between the two is the recoverable EV — see the strategy section.
Can you beat video poker with strategy?+
Always check the paytable BEFORE sitting down Full-pay Jacks or Better (9/6) vs short-pay (8/5) is a 2.24 percentage-point swing. On $1,000 of turnover, that's $22 lost.
What is the most common mistake in video poker?+
Playing short-pay variants without checking Cost: ~2 percentage points lower RTP. On extended play this is significant.
Where can I play video poker?+
Video poker is carried by 4 of the casinos we cover. See the "where to play" section on this page for the full list with tracked sign-up links.