Four Card Poker Odds & Strategy: The 5-vs-6 Card Battle
Last reviewed: July 2026
Four Card Poker gives the player two genuine concessions — the dealer never “fails to qualify,” and ties go to you — then wins anyway, because the dealer builds a best four-card hand from six cards while you build yours from five. Played with the simple strategy, the house keeps 3.40% of your ante (expert play reaches 2.79%). Here are the real numbers, and the one rule that covers the strategy.
How the game works
You ante and get five cards; the dealer gets six, one face up. After looking at your hand you either fold (losing the ante) or raise a Play bet of 1× to 3× your ante. Both sides then make their best four-card hand. Higher hand wins even money on both bets — and a tie counts as a win for you.
Four-card rankings (two quirks)
Best to worst: four of a kind → straight flush → three of a kind → flush → straight → two pair → pair → high card.
Note that three of a kind beats a flush and a flush beats a straight. The frequencies explain it — out of 2,598,960 possible five-card deals, your best four cards make:
| Best 4-card hand | Count | Probability |
|---|---|---|
| Four of a kind | 624 | 0.024% |
| Straight flush | 2,072 | 0.080% |
| Three of a kind | 58,656 | 2.257% |
| Flush | 114,616 | 4.410% |
| Straight | 101,808 | 3.917% |
| Two pair | 123,552 | 4.754% |
| Pair | 1,047,552 | 40.31% |
| High card | 1,150,080 | 44.25% |
(Those counts are exact — we enumerated every hand.)
The simple strategy
Raise 3× with a pair of tens or better. Raise 1× with a pair of twos through nines. Fold everything without a pair. That’s the entire simple strategy — you’ll fold about 44% of hands — and it yields a 3.40% house edge on the ante.
Why so aggressive with good pairs? Because when you have the edge you want maximum money behind it, and when you don’t you want minimum. The 1× vs 3× logic is worth understanding — it’s the most interesting decision in the game.
Experts who also read the dealer’s exposed card can trim the edge to 2.79%. Real, but modest — the simple rule captures most of the value.
Why the house still wins
No qualifying and ties-to-you sound like the casino giving money away. The sixth dealer card takes it all back: the dealer simply sees more cards than you, and their best-four is stronger often enough to fund both concessions. One consolation: because your average total wager is about 2.2 units per hand, the cost per dollar you actually put at risk is only about 1.56% — competitive with the friendlier table games.
The Ante Bonus
Three of a kind or better pays a bonus on your ante even when the dealer beats you: trips 2:1, straight flush 20:1, quads 25:1. It’s automatic — no extra bet.
And the side bet?
The Aces Up side bet pays on your own hand (pair of aces or better) up to 50:1 — at an exact 3.89% edge on the common paytable. More than the main game costs. The full breakdown: Is Aces Up worth it?
Want to feel the 5-vs-6 battle? Play Four Card Poker free → with strategy hints on, and watch the edge converge in the Lab — or compare it with every other game in the house-edge chart.