3 Card Poker – How To Play | Strategy & Tips To Win | Variants

Practice & Free Games

Most online casinos offer 3 card poker games in their library, and a fair few of them give you the chance to practice free. They will be simple to use, and offer a great way to practice without the risk of losing any cash.

When you’re ready to play for real cash you can take advantage of their welcome bonus. Be cautious though, winning in a practice game does not necessarily mean you’ll win when the chips are really down. 

As a starter you can play for free at VegasSlotsOnline, but in the ‘where to play 3 card poker’ section below you’ll see a few other recommended online casinos that do have practice games.

Aside from the casinos there are a few other apps or websites that’ll let you play for free:

The dedicated games area at AOL has the best free games selection I could find, including a version of 3 card.

This page at TableGamesOnline has an easy to use practice version.

3 Card Poker – How To Play Explained

OK let’s take a look at the mechanics of the game: 

The Basics

Two bets are made before any cards are dealt, these are known as the ‘ante’ and ‘pair plus’ bets. 

Playing The Ante In 3 Card Poker

The ante bet is played against the dealer, while the ‘pair plus’ bet is independent and pays out for poker hands of 1 pair or better. After your bets are placed you and the dealer are dealt 3 cards and you must decide whether to play or fold. The dealers hand is dealt face down so neither you or the dealer see it, so you must make your decision based just on just your own.

If you choose to play your hand in a 3 card poker game you must place another bet equal to the ante. Your hand is then compared to the dealer’s 3-card poker hand. If you fold, you lose and all money goes to the house. If your hand is better you win that hand.

Playing Pair Plus

In Pair Plus you’re not going up against the strength of the dealers hand, and whether you win or not is determined entirely by the strength of your own. If it’s good enough, you win. And a winning hand is achieved – as the name Pair Plus implies – by landing at least a pair in your three card hand and hopefully three of a kind, a flush, or a run.

Remember that if you’re playing both games and you fold, you’ll also lose the pair plus side of the bet. Though of course it would be a poor decision to fold with a pair or better already showing.

Winning Hands & Easy Ways To Remember 3 Card Payouts

1-to-1 is paid on both the ante and raise bets if you beat the dealer and the dealer’s hand ‘qualifies’. That is, you double your money on both bets. To qualify the dealer must hold queen high or better

A non-qualifying dealers hand (lower than a queen high) pays you 1-to-1 on the ante bet only (the ‘play’ bet is a push or returned) regardless of who holds the best hand.

In addition an ‘ante bonus’ is paid for straights (1-to-1), 3 of a kind (4-to-1) and straight flushes (5-to-1). These bonuses get paid even if you lose to a dealers qualifying hand.

Pair plus bets are paid independently of the dealer’s hand. This side-bet pays 1-to-1 for a pair, 4-to-1 for a flush, 5-to-1 for a straight, 30-to-1 for 3 of a kind and 40-to-1 for a straight flush. The pair plus bet is optional – though you would not be happy to see a straight flush if you decline this bet while playing!

All very well you might say, but I want an easy way to remember the card rankings, hand strength, and payout table – a sort of cheat sheet in fact.

Fortunately you won’t have to worry too much. All of the online casinos I’ve seen either display or have a quick link to the payout list. In most circumstances you’ll only ever be one click away from knowing what you can win with which hand and which hands to play.

Where To Play

All online casinos listed here offer practice and real money gaming, and are well recognized as secure and trusted. Each one welcomes players from around the world (though of course you should check that gambling is legal where you live before playing). All offer good value bonuses which will help increase your starting bankroll and give the maximum playing time.

If you don’t want to play at a real money casino, you may want to take a look at the options for playing 3 card in social casinos like Chumba Casino.

OK let’s see a few real money casinos which have three card games:

Bet365 also offers the game in their online casino. US players not accepted.

The Unibet Casino is a great place to go for live games.

But probably the most well known place to play is at 888. You can play 3 card poker for free online or with the risk of winning or losing cash at the popular 888 online casino, which accepts players from all over the world. There are download and no download versions to play. 

888’s online casino offers a wide variety of well known casino games,but many discerning players flock straight to the 888 version of 3 card poker.

888 3 card poker rules are pretty much the same as any other casino operators, but you do of course get an opportunity to sign up and get one of 888’s bonuses to increase your starting bankroll and give you a chance to try and beat the banker.

How To Play 888 3 Card Poker

888 lead into their version of 3 card poker with the words ”Heads up! Triple Card Poker is two games in one, the ‘Pair Plus’ and the ‘Ante Game’. You can play them together in a single hand or bet on each one separately”.

Of course that’s exactly right. It’s really two games in one – you’re either playing against the dealers 3 cards to get the best hand, or betting on getting a pair in your hand.

3 card poker is simple to play, fast paced, and profits or losses can swing rapidly either way. There is no skill really (other than sensible betting), it’s a typical casino game designed for enjoyment rather than as a guaranteed path to magnificent riches. Definitely one where you’ll want to have availed yourself of any betting bonuses on offer.

So here’s a walk through of the mechanics of how you do actually play 888 3 card.

You place a bet by clicking on any value chip and then clicking on Ante and/or Pair Plus. Your chosen value chip will be placed on whatever you clicked.

• Hit the Deal button to start the game.

• Before the hand is dealt, you do have the chance to change your bets either by clicking on Undo (to remove the last bet you made), Clear all bets (which takes everything off the table), or Double bet (obviously this doubles up all of your bets currently on the table).

• Both you and the dealer then get 3 cards.

• If you bet on pair plus (and your hand shows a pair or trips or a run or a flush), you win. It doesn’t matter what the dealer’s hand is. The higher your hand, the better odds you get on the payout.

• If you did not bet any chips on the Ante button in addition to Pair Plus, the hand is over and a new game is ready to begin.

• If you bet on Ante, you’re playing against the dealer.

• Look at your 3 cards. If you think your hand is a good one – and will beat the dealer’s -then click on Play to place another bet which will automatically be equal to your original Ante bet. Basically you are doubling up.

• If you think your hand is unlikely to beat the dealer,then fold. You don’t want to be risking more cash at this point.
• At this point, the dealer shows his cards and you compare the two hands.

• The dealer must have a high card queen or better to play.

• If the dealer does not have a queen at least, your original Ante bet pays double, but your Play bet is a ‘push’ and is returned to you with no winnings.

• If the dealer plays (has at least a queen), but your hand is a better one, both your Ante and Play bets pay back double.

• If the dealer plays, and his hand beats yours, you lose all bets. 

888 3 Card Poker Payouts

All payouts are always written on the table view itself.

• Ante and Play – pays 1-1.

• Ante pays an additional Ante bonus for certain hands: a straight pays 1-1, a set pays 4-1, and a royal flush pays 5-1.

• Pair Plus pays 1-1 for a pair, and up to 40-1 with a royal flush.

Aside from these there are plenty of others. If you have any difficulty finding the game listed at any online casino you’re visiting, it’s worth remembering it may be known under different names. Different casinos operate on different platforms ( the casino software that runs the games). 3 card poker may also be known as Tri Card Poker or Trey Card Poker on different software platforms.

3 Card Poker Strategy – How To Win

It’s no fun playing casino games if you don’t ever win, right? And if you do want to win playing 3 card poker you’re going to need to know how to play using the the optimal strategies. Knowing what to do (and when) might keep you winning small amounts, and increasing your chances to ultimately hit a big winning hand.

These strategies are fairly straightforward, so let’s take a look at what you can do to maximize your chances. 

Strategy For The Main Game – Against The Dealer 3 Card Poker Strategy

The basic strategy here pretty much makes the basis of a 3 Card betting system. Optimum player strategy against the dealer is to make the play or raise wager with Queen-6-4 or better and fold with anything lower, though the simpler strategy of playing queens or higher will give similar results. In fact, the dealer himself plays with the latter strategy of those two. This has been proven by a computer program which analysed all potential combinations of a players hand (22,100) against all combinations of the dealers cards (18,424).

Basically this means playing:

• Any pair or higher

• King or Ace high

• Queen high, when your second highest card is a 7 or higher

• Queen high, when your second card is a 6 and your third card is a 4 or higher

Of course, only playing bets made with those higher hands means folding all others, so you need to be patient and prepared to let a number of hands pass by without playing. If you don’t do this, the casino edge rises to around 7.65% from about 3.37 % with the optimal strategy.

You can see that as with all negative expectation gambling games there is no definite strategy that can overcome the built in house advantage which exists in all casino games. For this reason it’s very difficult, unless you’re extremely lucky, to come out ahead over a period of time. This leads to many players treating 3 card poker as a form of entertainment, rather than a money making enterprise. Exactly the way you should treat all casino games in fact.

Pair Plus Strategy

If you’re looking to get the occasional big win at 3 card poker, you’ll want to be making regular use of the pairs plus bet. The ante bonus on the regular play does offer the chance of reasonable wins too – though you won’t walk away a millionaire. And it’s worth noting the house advantage of 2.32% when you only play pair plus means you’ll struggle to find other casino card games giving you potentially as much value for money.

One thing to bear in mind about pair plus is that your wins and losses can be more volatile than in ante play. That does of course make it the riskier way to play meaning your expected losses over time will be higher than in ante play.

As far as strategy for pair plus goes, there’s not a great deal to think about. The odds are against you, but you’re going for the bigger wins. It’s going to be down to pure luck on whether you’ll get dealt a winning hand, so the only real strategy you can follow is one around staking or betting.

Basic Betting Strategy

The most common wager strategies are to play Ante and Pair Plus wagers for equal amounts, or for one of the Ante and Pair Plus wagers to be double the amount of the other one of the Ante and Pair Plus wagers.

The best way to bet in 3 card poker is to place 100% of your total bet on the Ante, because that’s where the lowest house edge is. But we’ve seen that Pair plus gives the higher odds – and in the rare circumstances where you get paid on the ante game but with a three of a kind hand you’re going to feel a little put out if you didn’t collect on it with a pair plus bet. Even so, if you can avoid the temptation then the best strategy is to do so. In the long run you’ll have more chance of coming out ahead.

Bankroll Strategy – Protecting Your Bankroll In 3 Card Poker Games

The only real decision you’ll need to make in pair plus play is on how much to bet, so other useful strategies to employ revolve around money and bankroll management. You want to preserve your betting bank for as long as possible. More money means more games, and more chances to hit those 3 cards that will give you a big win.

One good way to preserve your bank is to be fully aware of how much you have won, or lost, in your current sitting. Putting aside small amounts if you’re on a winning streak is a good idea.

Clearly it’s worth shopping around and making use of any valuable betting bonuses you can find too.

What Else Can Help?

If you get involved in any game where the dealer shows one of his cards, there’s a chance to gain a 3.5% advantage. Of course you’ll need to be able to work out the best way of using that information and this is not something you’ll come across in most three card games you’ll find.

Probability 

FAQ What are the odds in 3 card poker?

This section covers how to calculate the probabilities in 3 Card Poker – the likelihood of you receiving any particular winning or losing hand. Probabilities are not so important to understand here as they are when playing optimal poker strategy in other poker games. 

There are 22100 ways to draw 3 cards out of a 52 card pack, so to find out the mathematical probability of getting any hand you can just divide any of the numbers denoting how many ways to get dealt that hand (below) by 22100. 

Straight Flush

With 4 possible suits for a straight flush, you can get any combination from A23 to QKA, or 12 different straight flush hands. So the total number of straight flushes is 4*12=48. 

Three Of A Kind

There are 13 options for getting a three of a kind hand. There are 4 ways to get 3 suits out of 4. So there are 52 potential three of a kinds. 

Straights

There are 12 possible hands for a straight flush, but a straight in 3 card poker can be a hand with any suit. A straight has 3 cards, each may be one of any of the four suits. However if all three cards are of the same suit then you’ll have a straight flush. 720 possible straights. 

Flush

There are 4 possible suits for a flush hand. For each of the suits there are 286 ways to get 3 out of 13. But we know from the straight flush section above that there are 12 combinations which give us three connected cards, giving you a straight flush. So the hand combinations that land you a straight which isn’t a straight flush is 274. So the number of flush combinations is 4 x 274, or 1096. 

Pair

There are 13 possible pairs, which gives you 156 ways to land one. Within the pair there are 6 ways to get 2 suits out of the possible 4. So the total number of different pair combinations is 3744. 

Nothing in 3 Card Poker Hands

The number of ways to get a nothing hand (ie less than a pair) is 16440.