[Article] - Pot Odds Calculation

Having the ability to quickly and accurately calculate odds at the table can be crucial to your long-term success as a poker player.



True or false?: All of the decisions you make at a poker table can be made by feel, without any serious consideration for the actual numbers you face.

The answer is, absolutely false. There are a select few decisions at the table which require no consideration of odds, such as calling an all-in bet while holding the nuts on the river. Outside of plays made purely on a read of your opponent, all decisions in poker are made through an evaluation of the odds.

Even players playing by feel, who never actually make any calculations at the table, are still playing the odds. They just don't know the numbers associated with what looks and feels like odds decisions to them.

In order to use the numbers to evaluate the quality of your decisions, you need to calculate the pot odds and your equity, and then compare the two. If the odds are greater than your equity, you're making money; if the odds are less, you're losing money.


A calculated look.

It doesn't matter whether you start with the pot odds or your hand equity. Each of these numbers are independent of each other, but are completely useless until you have them both to evaluate.

In this article we'll look at pot odds, and in part two, hand equity.

Pot Odds

Count the pot: Actually counting the pot is incredibly difficult to do once it's grown large, especially when there are chips of multiple denominations piled together. The best idea is to keep a running count of the total pot as the hand progresses.

$2-$5 game: UTG raises to $15; folded to the cut-off, who calls. The button calls as does the small blind; the big blind folds.

What's the pot? Trying to add it up now is a little bit of a task, whereas if you keep a running total in your head as you go, it will be much simpler.

When you're keeping track of the pre-flop action, it helps to ignore the blinds until after they have acted; otherwise you have to subtract from your total what they already had in from the amount they called, adding the difference to your total. That's just too much work.

If you start at UTG, it's pretty simple: UTG raises to $15, cut-off calls ($30), button calls ($45), small blind calls ($60), big blind folds ($65).

Create a ratio: In the same scenario as above, the pre-flop raiser bets out $50. What are the pot odds to the player in the cut-off?

First, you have to add the bet to the total pot, making the total pot $115. The player must call $50 for a pot of $115. This creates your first ratio: $115-$50. Now to make things easy to work with, we want to make the right side of the ratio 1. Since I'm sure you've all forgotten your grade nine math:

115-50: If you want to turn the right side into a 1, you need to divide it by itself (50/50=1). What you do to one side of a ratio, you must do to the other, so 115/50 = 2.3. This makes your new ratio 2.3-1.

The cut-off's pot odds are 2.3-1.

Here's a trick to doing that last calculation in your head. At the table you don't need to be exact; getting yourself close will do just fine. To divide two numbers, take out the largest possible chunk that the divisor goes into without a fraction.

We know that 100/50 = 2, and 150/50 = 3. Since 150 is larger than the number, the largest chunk we can take out is 100. We now know out first number is a 2. That just leaves us with 15 (115 - 100).

Approximately how many times does 15 go into 50? 15*3 = 45. That's as close as we can get, since 45 is closer to 50 than 60. That gives us our second number (the remainder) of 3. Put the two together and we have: 2.3. It just so happens that in this example, the shortcut method brings the actual correct example.


What's a greatest common denominator?

Let's say the cut-off calls. What are the pot odds to the button now? Try to do that up in your head right now. If you're having trouble, here's a step-by-step numbers walk-through:

Pot = $115 + $50

Pot = $165

Odds = $165/$50

50 * 3 = 150 (first number is 3)

165 - 150 = 15

50/15 = close to 3

Odds = 3.3:1

Hopefully you caught on to the most important shortcut. Once we calculated the odds for the cut-off, and he calls, the odds to the button will be exactly better by one: 2.3 + 1= 3.3. There is no need to recalculate if a player only calls; just add one. Once another player raises, only then must you recalculate.

If what you just read has really confused you, you can check out this more basic article on the same topic. Between this one and that one, you should have odds figured out in no time.

In part two , you will learn how to evaluate hand equity, and finally how to compare the two numbers to get your result.

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