How are you supposed to know where you're going if you don't know where you are?
Position is greatly undervalued by every beginner poker player. Your table position is often the difference between winning a hand and losing one.
Before playing a hand in Texas Hold'em you should always be aware of your position relative to the dealer button. Take a look at your position before you take a look at your cards.
Key for PokerStove Hand Range Charts:-Green for all the pairs-Red for suited hands (everything up and right of the pairs) These hands also have a little s after them-Grey for offsuit hands (everything down and left of the pairs) These hands also have a little o after them-Yellow for a hand that has been selected. So in any given chart.
- The seats nearest to the are called early position or EP for short.
- The seats nearest to the right of the button are called late position or LP for short.
- The seats in between these will be called middle position or MP.
Poker table position diagram.
- You make the most decisions preflop of any street. Learn how to play fundamentally sound poker preflop by signing up to get my preflop charts. I show you almost every scenario you will face. Learning how to play solid preflop is the first step towards becoming a winning player.
- Congratulations on taking a step. Will greatly impact the rest of the hand. The hands are organized by position or the order in which you act at the table. Play starts out with the Under The Gun (UTG) player, then moves to UTG+1, UTG+2. If I choose which hands to play based on these charts, won't that make me predictable?
- In smaller poker games, players tend to include far too many hands into their preflop ranges. This gives you ample opportunity to find bluff 3bets, +EV preflop calls, and to be proactive in your postflop line creation. Memorize These 5 Poker Ranges. To make your life easier, here are 5 preflop poker ranges that you need to memorize.
- The seats in Red are early position
- The seats in Blue are middle position
- The seats in Green are late position
Early position.
Early Position is least favorable because you'll be one of the first to act after the flop. You want to avoid playing weak cards from these positions. You're relying on your cards to help you win the pot, as being first to act throughout the hand gives you less opportunities to outplay your opponents.
Don't get yourself in to trouble from EP.
Middle position.
Middle Position is better than Early Position, but it's not as awesome as Late Position. You can afford to play a few more hands from MP than you would from EP, as you do not have as many people left who can call and act after you from the flop onwards.
However, if all of the players from Early Position fold, this will still mean that you will be the first to act on each round. When it comes to poker strategy, it's not so much about your seat at the table as it is about who you've got acting before you and who you've got acting after you.
Late position.
Late Position. is highly advantageous.
There is a high chance that you will be last (or one of the last) to act on each round. This is so powerful it means you can be far more flexible with the range of hands you play. Just remember, just because you have position it doesn't mean you can get away with playing absolute junk all of the time.
'Being in position', 'having position' and 'positional advantage' all mean the same thing. Although it probably makes more sense to think of a positional advantage as an informational advantage.
Poker Hands Order Chart
The button.
The Button is the best seat in the hand because on every betting round (except for before the flop), you will be last to act. This is amazing. This is also why you should look to play as many hands as possible (within reason) from the button. I'm usually looking for a reason not to play my hand when I'm on the BTN
The cut off.
The 'cut-off' is the position just before the button. This is the second best seat in Texas Hold'em because if the button folds, you will be the last to act on each hand. The button and cut-off are very useful positions for stealing the blinds as there are less players to act behind you, which makes it less likely that they are holding a good enough hand to call a raise with.
How to use table position in poker.
If you have position over another player, it means that you are acting after them on each round.
This means they will give you information before you make your decision.
- They could check - possibly a sign of weakness.
- They could bet - possibly a sign of strength.
- If they bet, the size of their bet could mean something.
- The time it takes for them to make their decision may also give you extra clues.
For example; if you have position over your opponent and they check quickly, this could be a sign of weakness. So you could use this information to bet out and take the pot. It's not always this easy, but getting some kind of information is infinitely better than being the one giving information to your opponent.
Poker table position example.
Lets say you're on the flop with a bunch of players in the pot, and you hold a mediocre hand like middle pair.
If there's a lot of betting and raising before the action gets to you, you can be sure that your hand isn't the best and you can happily fold without losing any chips.
On the other hand, if you are in early position you may bet out with a decent hand, only to find that there are much stronger hands out there that will re-raise you and force you to fold. Therefore you will have lost chips due to a lack of information.
The later you act in a hand, the more information you will have available to you about your opponents.
Positional awareness.
In general, you want to play more hands in position than you do out of position.
This doesn't mean that you force yourself to play any old hand when you have good position. Instead, be more inclined to play a wider range of hands when IP, but don't play this wide range of hands when OOP.
- The seats in Red are early position
- The seats in Blue are middle position
- The seats in Green are late position
Early position.
Early Position is least favorable because you'll be one of the first to act after the flop. You want to avoid playing weak cards from these positions. You're relying on your cards to help you win the pot, as being first to act throughout the hand gives you less opportunities to outplay your opponents.
Don't get yourself in to trouble from EP.
Middle position.
Middle Position is better than Early Position, but it's not as awesome as Late Position. You can afford to play a few more hands from MP than you would from EP, as you do not have as many people left who can call and act after you from the flop onwards.
However, if all of the players from Early Position fold, this will still mean that you will be the first to act on each round. When it comes to poker strategy, it's not so much about your seat at the table as it is about who you've got acting before you and who you've got acting after you.
Late position.
Late Position. is highly advantageous.
There is a high chance that you will be last (or one of the last) to act on each round. This is so powerful it means you can be far more flexible with the range of hands you play. Just remember, just because you have position it doesn't mean you can get away with playing absolute junk all of the time.
'Being in position', 'having position' and 'positional advantage' all mean the same thing. Although it probably makes more sense to think of a positional advantage as an informational advantage.
Poker Hands Order Chart
The button.
The Button is the best seat in the hand because on every betting round (except for before the flop), you will be last to act. This is amazing. This is also why you should look to play as many hands as possible (within reason) from the button. I'm usually looking for a reason not to play my hand when I'm on the BTN
The cut off.
The 'cut-off' is the position just before the button. This is the second best seat in Texas Hold'em because if the button folds, you will be the last to act on each hand. The button and cut-off are very useful positions for stealing the blinds as there are less players to act behind you, which makes it less likely that they are holding a good enough hand to call a raise with.
How to use table position in poker.
If you have position over another player, it means that you are acting after them on each round.
This means they will give you information before you make your decision.
- They could check - possibly a sign of weakness.
- They could bet - possibly a sign of strength.
- If they bet, the size of their bet could mean something.
- The time it takes for them to make their decision may also give you extra clues.
For example; if you have position over your opponent and they check quickly, this could be a sign of weakness. So you could use this information to bet out and take the pot. It's not always this easy, but getting some kind of information is infinitely better than being the one giving information to your opponent.
Poker table position example.
Lets say you're on the flop with a bunch of players in the pot, and you hold a mediocre hand like middle pair.
If there's a lot of betting and raising before the action gets to you, you can be sure that your hand isn't the best and you can happily fold without losing any chips.
On the other hand, if you are in early position you may bet out with a decent hand, only to find that there are much stronger hands out there that will re-raise you and force you to fold. Therefore you will have lost chips due to a lack of information.
The later you act in a hand, the more information you will have available to you about your opponents.
Positional awareness.
In general, you want to play more hands in position than you do out of position.
This doesn't mean that you force yourself to play any old hand when you have good position. Instead, be more inclined to play a wider range of hands when IP, but don't play this wide range of hands when OOP.
Try not to think of your position as dictating which hands you can and can't play. Instead, think of it as taking advantage of being last to act as often as you can.
Take KJo for example:
- In early position I would be reluctant to play KJo. It's on the low end of the 'good hands', and the fact that I have poor position makes it an unattractive situation. The hand isn't strong enough to counteract my positional disadvantage.
- In late position I would raise this hand almost every time if there were no raisers before me. I may also call raises with this hand if I have position on the raiser. I have an advantageous position combined with a decent starting hand, so the situation is looking good.
As a beginner player it's tricky to get to grips with the hands that are okay to play in LP, but are not good to play in EP. How are you supposed to learn the subtleties of which starting hands to play in which positions?
Trust me, you will pick it up as you go along. It will take time, but the more experience you get under your belt the more you'll get to grips with it. If you're completely new to the game, there's no harm in sticking with the premium hands and entering pots with them irrespective of position – that's okay. Just be prepared to broaden your starting hand requirements based on position as you improve.
Positional awareness graph.
Following on from my last point about playing more hands in position, here's a graph that shows a winning player's VPIP based on their position in 6max cash games.
The graph above shows the seats acting from first to last during the preflop betting round. So…
- UTG - This is the seat to the left of the big blind. This is the first player to act preflop.
- MP - This term can to varying positions between early position and late position. In this example it is the seat to the left of the UTG position.
- CO - The seat just before the button. This is the second best position in the game.
- BTN - The best seat at the table. This player acts last on every postflop betting round.
- SB
- BB
VPIP indicates the percentage of the time a player either raises or calls preflop. So essentially this chart shows the percentage of the time they 'play a hand' from each position.
Notice how this player is playing a lot more hands in late position than they are in early position. They do not play the same set of hands from all positions. They're not forcing these statistics either – they're just wisely taking in to account their table position and then selecting which starting hands to play with.
If you asked any winning cash game player to show you their VPIP by position, their stats and graphs would follow a similar trend to the one above.
You can find out your own VPIP stats (and also those of your opponents) by using the popular Poker Tracker software.
Evaluation.
Table position is easily one of the most underestimated factors in playing a hand by many amateur poker players. Position is so important that often hands can be won or lost based on your position alone, irrespective of the strength of the cards that you and your opponent hold.
The sooner you start paying attention to your position, the sooner you will start making more money.
Further reading.
A useful article to read from here is starting hand selection, as it highlights how you should stick to playing only the strongest hands from early position due to the big disadvantage of having to act first on betting rounds.
Related articles.
- The Importance Of Position (Jack Wilcox)
Go back to the awesome Texas Hold'em Strategy.
Comments
Follow these hand charts and learn how to play your starting hands at Texas Holdem.
Poker Table Position Chart
The charts below will give you a great starting point on how to play your starting hands. For all of you beginners, we recommend consulting these charts will playing online.
We provide 4 separate charts depending on where you are seated relative to the dealer. You can find out how to play the Blinds, Early Position, Middle Position, and Late Position.
After the flop, you can consult the Drawing Odds Chart at the bottom, but you will also have to develop your reads, pot odds and other skills to develop your post-flop strategies.
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How to Read the Starting Hand Charts
Let's look at some examples of how to use these poker odds charts…
| Early Position 88 77 | Unraised Pot Call 1 | Raised Pot Poker rules betting and raising. Fold |
| * In early position, only call with A8s or 77 if there is already at least one caller in the pot. Fold if you are first in or if the pot has been raised. |
| Middle Position 98s | Unraised Pot Call 3 | Raised Pot Fold |
| * In middle position, only call only play 98s if there are already three or more callers. Do not call raises. |
| Late Position JJ TT 99 | Unraised Pot Raise 1, Call 2 Raise First In, Call 1 | Raised Pot RR 1 Option, Call All RR or Fold against 1 Player, Call 3 |
| * In late position, you should raise with JJ against one caller or first in, and call against two callers or more. You have the option of rerasing a lone raiser; otherwise, always call a raise. * Raise 99 when you are first in from late position; otherwise, call if the pot has not been raised. If the pot has been raised, you should either re-raise or fold when against a single player, or call if there are three players in the hand. |
| Blinds AQs AQ A9s KJ | SB Unraised Pot Raise 1 or 2, Call 3 Call Call | SB Raised Pot RR 1 or 2, Call 3 RR Lone Late, Fold Fold | BB Raised Pot Call (raise 1 or 2 limpers) Call Call 2, or 1 Late |
* In the small blind, you can raise or reraise one or two opponents with AQ, otherwise, call against three or more opponents. * In the small blind, always call A9s against limpers. If the pot has been raised, you should reraise a late position player. You should fold if the raiser is in early or middle position or against two or more opponents. * In the big blind, you can call with KJ against two opponents or a lone late player. Fold against a lone player from early or middle position. |
With a little practice, you should be able to find the appropriate poker strategy very quickly. I recommend keeping these charts open to provide guidance as you play. May the odds be with you! – Matthew Hilger
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