Using Hand Ranges to Read Hands

Reading hands is a critical poker skill. The better you can key in on the sort of hands your opponents have, the better decisions you will make, and the better your results will be. Most players use some sort of hand-reading process to inform their decisions.

But, not all hand-reading processes are equally good. Many of them are hit-or-miss, leading the practitioners to make occasional brilliant plays, but perhaps even more often, leading them astray. These hit-or-miss systems often have something in common: They focus quickly on one (or a few) possible holding to the exclusion of other possibilities. You may have listened to someone relate a hand story to you that goes like this:

“Well, he raised preflop and I called with 6-6. The flop was Q-10-7, but I put him on A-K, so I decided to call him down unless another big card came.”

The problem with this thinking is the narrow focus on one hand — in this case, A-K. Sure, most players raise preflop when they get A-K, but they also raise with A-A, K-K, Q-Q, J-J, and many other hands. Many players would fire a continuation-bet on a Q-10-7 flop with many of those holdings, not just A-K.

It’s misleading to focus so narrowly on just a single possible holding so early in the hand. Instead, when you’re reading hands, you should think in terms of hand ranges.

Thinking in terms of hand ranges acknowledges that we can’t have perfect knowledge when using just the small bits of information that we get during a poker hand. A preflop raise doesn’t indicate specifically A-K, J-J, or any other hand. The most we can know is that, typically, when our opponent raises, he’ll have, to use an example for a hypothetical opponent, one of the following hands: any pocket pair, an ace with a 7 or better, two cards 10 or higher, or maybe a suited connector. (When discussing hand ranges, writers generally use a shorthand notation. The preceding hand range could be written in shorthand as 2-2+, A-7+, K-10+, Q-10+, J-10, 10-9 suited to 5-4 suited.)

We refine the hand range as the hand progresses. Let’s say an opponent has raised preflop (with the likely hand range described above), and we call. The flop comes Q 10 7. He bets. He’s an aggressive player, so we expect that he might bet with every hand in his range. We therefore can’t narrow our opponent’s hand range yet.

Does he likely have a strong hand, a weak hand, or something in between? Each of these options is possible, given the hands that we think our opponent could have. He could have a very strong hand like Q-Q, 10-10, or Q-10. He could have a very weak hand like 3-3 or A-8. And he could have a middling hand like Q-J, J-J, or K-10.

We can do better, however, than simply concluding, “He could have anything.” We can count the number of hands that fall into each strength category. The more hands in the range that fit into a strength category, the more likely it is that he holds a hand of that strength. Relatively few hands in our opponent’s range are truly strong. We can count Q-Q, 10-10, 7-7, Q-10, A-A, K-K, A-Q, the K J, and any hand that contains the Q and another spade among these strong holdings. Also, on this flop, relatively few hands are truly weak. Only the small pocket pairs, 6-5 suited, 5-4 suited, A-9, and A-8 really fit into this category.

Most of our opponent’s hands are of medium strength. He likely flopped either a pair with a hand like K-10, a straight draw with a hand like K-J or 9-8 suited, or a gutshot and overcards with A-K.

Comparing our opponent’s hand range to the board and determining the number of strong, medium, and weak hands (along with types, like drawing hands, two-pair hands, one-pair hands, and so on) is the essence of hand reading. If we held a weak hand such as 4-4 in this situation, we would be wise to fold. Our opponent’s range is much stronger, on average, than our hand, and his range is also likely to be too strong to run a successful bluff against.

Let’s say, however, that we held the K Q. This hand is certainly strong enough compared to our opponent’s range to justify calling. After we call the flop, the 7 comes on the turn, and our opponent checks. Now what does his hand range look like?

This new information enables us to refine our opponent’s range. He may have decided to bet the turn with the strongest hands in his original range and also with A-7, 8-7 suited, and 7-6 suited. He likely would have given up with the weak hands, given that none of them have improved. And he may have checked with many of his medium-strength hands, not wanting to build a big pot with them.

Therefore, it’s just as likely as before that he holds 2-2 or A-8, but significantly less likely than before that he holds Q-Q or A-A. The turn check tells us that the weaker hands in the original range have become more likely relative to the stronger ones. We can never discount the strong hands entirely, because our opponent might be trying to trap us. But we can fairly assume that they are less likely after the turn check than before.

Let’s say that we check it back with the K Q. This is a reasonable play. The river is the 3, and our opponent checks again.

Now we can almost completely discount the strong holdings. Few opponents would check a strong hand twice in this situation. Weak hands are again as likely as before, as are many of the medium-strength hands. We can fairly safely narrow our opponent’s range to busted draws, two-pair hands roughly K-Q and weaker, and very weak hands like ace high and 2-2. Our hand, K-Q, is very strong against this range. Furthermore, our opponent may think many of the hands in his range are too strong to fold. Therefore, our hand reading indicates that we can make a clearly profitable value-bet.

Thinking in terms of hand ranges is the best way to read hands. The hand-range model best represents the imperfect information that we gather, and it enables us to make the most informed decisions. If reading hands this way is new to you, try it out. It’s difficult to get the hang of it, but it’s well worth it — so practice, practice, practice.

Ed’s brand-new book, Small Stakes No-Limit Hold’em, is available for purchase at smallstakesnolimitholdem.com. He is a featured coach at stoxpoker.com, and you can also check out his online poker advice column, notedpokerauthority.com.