Three Card Poker is one of the simplest table games in the casino. You get three cards, the dealer gets three cards, and you make one decision: play or fold. That one decision still matters. Fold too much and you hand the dealer free antes. Play everything and the house edge more than doubles. The good news is that perfect strategy fits in three characters: Q-6-4. Most of the remaining skill is picking a table with good pay tables for the side bets.
How to play
- Place an Ante. You can also bet Pair Plus and the 6-Card Bonus, which are side bets.
- You and the dealer each get three cards. The deck is reshuffled every hand.
- Look at your hand and either fold (you lose the ante) or play by placing a Play bet equal to your ante.
- The dealer turns over their cards. The dealer qualifies with queen high or better.
- Dealer doesn’t qualify: your ante pays 1 to 1 and your Play bet pushes.
- Dealer qualifies: the higher hand wins. If you win, the Ante and Play each pay 1 to 1. If you tie, both push. If the dealer wins, both lose.
- If you played, the Ante Bonus pays on a straight or better, whatever the dealer holds. The side bets pay on their own tables.
Three-card hand rankings
Rankings differ from regular poker because three-card hands have different odds:
| Hand | Ways (of 22,100) | Probability |
|---|---|---|
| Straight flush | 48 | 0.217% |
| Three of a kind | 52 | 0.235% |
| Straight | 720 | 3.258% |
| Flush | 1,096 | 4.959% |
| Pair | 3,744 | 16.941% |
| High card | 16,440 | 74.389% |
A straight beats a flush here. A-2-3 is the lowest straight. Some tables count A-K-Q suited as a “mini royal.”
Payouts
Ante Bonus (paid on the ante when you play)
| Table | Straight flush | Three of a kind | Straight | House edge (ante) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 (most common) | 5 to 1 | 4 to 1 | 1 to 1 | 3.37% |
| 2 | 4 to 1 | 3 to 1 | 1 to 1 | 3.83% |
| 3 | 3 to 1 | 2 to 1 | 1 to 1 | 4.28% |
| 4 | 5 to 1 | 3 to 1 | 1 to 1 | 3.61% |
Pair Plus (pays on your three cards alone)
Pay tables are listed as straight flush / trips / straight / flush / pair.
| Pay table | House edge |
|---|---|
| Mini royal 50, then 40-30-6-4-1 | 2.14% |
| 40-30-6-4-1 | 2.32% |
| 35-33-6-4-1 | 2.70% |
| 40-25-6-4-1 | 3.49% |
| 35-25-6-4-1 | 4.58% |
| 40-30-5-4-1 | 5.57% |
| 40-30-6-3-1 | 7.28% |
6-Card Bonus (your three cards plus the dealer’s three)
Pay tables are listed as royal / straight flush / quads / full house / flush / straight / trips.
| Pay table | House edge |
|---|---|
| 1000-200-100-20-15-10-7 | 8.56% |
| 1000-200-50-25-20-10-5 | 10.22% |
| 2000-200-50-25-15-10-5 | 14.36% |
| 1000-200-50-25-15-10-5 | 15.28% |
Strategy
The rule
Play any pair or better. Play any high-card hand of Q-6-4 or better. Fold everything else.
That’s the complete optimal strategy, and it holds for every Ante Bonus table above. Casino Coach checks it by brute force. It works out every dealer hand for every distinct player hand, and the Q-6-4 rule matches the best decision every time.
How to read a high-card hand
Compare your cards from the top down, like reading a number:
- King high or ace high: always play. K-4-2 plays. A-3-2 plays.
- Jack high or lower: always fold. J-10-8 folds, even though it looks close.
- Queen high: look at the second card.
- Q-7-x or better: play. Q♠ 7♦ 2♣ plays.
- Q-5-x or worse: fold. Q♥ 5♣ 4♦ folds.
- Q-6-x: look at the third card. Q-6-4 and Q-6-5 play. Q-6-3 and Q-6-2 fold.
Any pair plays, even 2♠ 2♦ 5♣. Flushes, straights and better always play too, and they also earn the ante bonus.
Why the line is so fine
At the cutoff, both choices lose money and you’re picking the smaller loss. Folding always costs exactly 1 ante. Exact enumeration puts playing Q-6-4 at −0.993 antes, slightly better than folding. Playing Q-6-3 comes out at −1.003, slightly worse. Missing the line by one card costs very little per hand. Ignoring it altogether costs a lot.
What about “mimic the dealer”?
Some players play any queen high or better, copying the dealer’s qualifying rule. Per Wizard of Odds analysis that gives a 3.45% edge, close to the optimal 3.37%. The Q-6-4 rule is no harder to remember, though, so use it.
Common mistakes
- Playing every hand. “Never fold” raises the house edge from 3.37% to about 7.65% of the ante.
- Folding a pair or any made hand. You give up a strong hand and the chance at the ante bonus.
- Folding king-high or ace-high hands. They always play, even K-3-2.
- Betting Pair Plus on the 40-30-6-3-1 table. That one point on a flush takes the edge from 2.32% to 7.28%.
- Making the 6-Card Bonus a habit. Its edge runs from 8.56% to 15.28%, the worst bet on the layout.
- Thinking a flush beats a straight. In three-card poker it’s the other way round.
House edge explained
The house edge on the ante is 3.37% with optimal play on the most common Ante Bonus table, per Wizard of Odds, and Casino Coach’s exact enumeration reproduces it. That figure is per ante. You often double your bet with a Play wager, so the edge per total money bet (element of risk) is about 2.0%.
What drives the edge:
- The qualifier. When the dealer misses queen high, your Play bet only pushes. Your best wins against weak dealer hands get cut in half.
- Folding. Every hand you fold is a lost ante. That’s the price of not playing hands that would lose more.
- The ante bonus pays some of that back on straights and better, which is why Table 1 (5-4-1) beats Table 3 (3-2-1).
What to look for:
- Pair Plus: look for 4 to 1 on a flush and 6 to 1 on a straight. Avoid 40-30-6-3-1, a common table on the Las Vegas Strip.
- Ante Bonus: the 5-4-1 table is best. The 3-2-1 table adds almost a full percent.
- 6-Card Bonus: skip it, or keep it tiny.
No strategy removes the house edge here. Playing Q-6-4 just keeps it as low as it goes.
Practice in Casino Coach
Casino Coach’s Three Card Poker table has a trainer mode. It grades every play-or-fold call against the Q-6-4 rule and shows the exact EV of playing versus folding. You can set it to block wrong plays until you fix them. You can choose the Ante Bonus, Pair Plus and 6-Card Bonus pay tables and see what each costs. Three drills build the habit: Play or fold (adaptive flashcards that focus on queen-high hands near the Q-6-4 line), Which hand wins? (straight versus flush and close high cards) and Payout drill (ante, play, ante bonus and Pair Plus). Analytics track your accuracy and the EV each mistake cost. Train free with chips that have no cash value.
Three Card Poker FAQ
What is the best strategy for Three Card Poker?
Play any pair or better, and any high-card hand of Q-6-4 or better. Fold everything worse. That rule is optimal for every common ante bonus pay table.
Why is Q-6-4 the cutoff in Three Card Poker?
Exact enumeration shows that playing Q-6-4 loses slightly less than folding, while playing Q-6-3 loses slightly more. The dealer needs queen high to qualify, so weak queens are right on the line.
Is a straight better than a flush in Three Card Poker?
Yes. With only three cards, straights are rarer than flushes (720 versus 1,096 of the 22,100 possible hands), so a straight ranks higher.
Is Pair Plus a good bet?
It depends on the pay table. On 40-30-6-4-1 the house edge is 2.32%, but on the 40-30-6-3-1 table, where a flush pays 3 to 1, it is 7.28%.
What happens if you play every hand in Three Card Poker?
Never folding raises the house edge from 3.37% to about 7.65% of the ante, more than double.
Practise Three Card Poker until it's automatic
Real table, free chips, and a trainer that grades every decision with the expected value of each option.
Updated October 24, 2026