Free Video Poker
Full-pay Jacks or Better, played for chips that are worth nothing, with every hold checked against the exact best one.
Play chips
1,000
No real money, no prizes, nothing to buy.
| Royal flush | 20,000 |
|---|---|
| Straight flush | 1,250 |
| Four of a kind | 625 |
| Full house | 225 |
| Flush | 150 |
| Straight | 100 |
| Three of a kind | 75 |
| Two pair | 50 |
| Jacks or better | 25 |
Pick a bet and deal.
Session coach
Last round
Nothing played yet. After each of your hands the coach says what the round cost and what decided it.
Decide the cost before you start
Gambling is entertainment with a price, like a concert ticket. The useful question is not how much you might win but how much the evening is allowed to cost. Pick that number first, and treat reaching it as the end of the session. You can set one below and the coach will hold you to it.
Next bet
25 chips at a 0.46% house edge: an expected cost of 0.1 chips.
- Hands played
- 0
- Chips bet in total
- 0
- Bets raised after a loss
- 0
Where the result came from
- House edge, on average
- 0
- Decisions on strategy
- None yet
- Your off-strategy plays
- 0
- Luck
- 0
- Result
- 0
The report fills in as you play. Compare pay tables and their returns
Set a session limit
Your leaks
None recorded. A spot you play off the best strategy is listed here so you can practise it, and drops off once you get it right three times running. The list is kept in this browser only.
This table is for practice and entertainment only. How to keep gambling safe
Hold coach
Every hand has 32 ways to hold it, and one of them returns the most on average. After each draw the coach tells you which, worked out exactly from the 47 cards you could not see.
This session
- Hands played
- 0
- Best holds
- None yet
- Net chips
- 0
- Expected with best holds
- 0
This machine returns 99.54% of the chips bet when every hold is the best one, a house edge of 0.46%. Almost all of a short session is luck: the royal flush alone is 2.0 points of that return and arrives about once in 40,000 hands.
Built by Alexander Korsager · last updated October 3, 2026 · corrections
- Returned with every hold played right
- 99.54%
- House edge that best play still leaves
- 0.46%
- Ways to hold a dealt hand, each one priced
- 32
- Hands for one royal flush, on average
- 40,000
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A machine that prices every hold
Video poker is the one machine in a casino where what you do changes what you get back.
Every dealt hand can be held 32 different ways, and one of them returns more on average than the others. Finding it is a skill, and it is the skill this table is built to practice.
- Held
- Held
- Not held
- Not held
- Not held
- Hold K♠ K♦153.70
The best hold of this hand
- Hold 10♥ J♥ Q♥146.50
Gives up 7.20 chips on average
- Hold K♠ K♦ 10♥ J♥ Q♥100
Gives up 53.70 chips on average
Chips back on average on a 100-chip bet, from every possible draw. The best hold and two others are shown. None of the 32 returns more than the first.
After each draw the coach shows the best hold for the hand you were dealt and, if yours was different, how many chips the difference costs on average.
That figure is worked out exactly, by drawing every possible replacement from the 47 cards you could not see. Play every hold right on this pay table and the machine returns 99.54%. Nothing returns more than that, and most machines on a casino floor use a pay table that returns less.
- 9/6 Jacks or Better0.46%
Returns 99.54%. The pay table on this machine.
- 9/5 Jacks or Better1.55%
Returns 98.45%
- 8/6 Jacks or Better1.61%
Returns 98.39%
- 8/5 Jacks or Better2.70%
Returns 97.30%
- 7/5 Jacks or Better3.85%
Returns 96.15%
- 6/5 Jacks or Better5.00%
Returns 95.00%
Each pay table is named for what it pays on a full house and a flush. The figures are the video poker return calculator's solved games.
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Rules at this table
| Hand | Pays per chip | Points of the return |
|---|---|---|
| Royal flush | 800 | 2.0 |
| Straight flush | 50 | 0.5 |
| Four of a kind | 25 | 5.9 |
| Full house | 9 | 10.4 |
| Flush | 6 | 6.6 |
| Straight | 4 | 4.5 |
| Three of a kind | 3 | 22.3 |
| Two pair | 2 | 25.9 |
| Jacks or better | 1 | 21.5 |
Points are each hand's share of the 99.54% return with every hold played right: how often the hand arrives, times what it pays.
- One standard 52-card deck, shuffled fresh for every hand.
- You are dealt five cards, hold any of them, and the rest are replaced once.
- The final hand is paid by the table: a pair of jacks or better is the lowest hand that pays.
- The pay table is 9/6 Jacks or Better: a full house pays 9 and a flush pays 6 for each chip bet.
- A royal flush pays 800 for each chip bet, the rate a real machine pays at its maximum bet.
- Bets are 5, 25, 50, 100 chips a hand.
- 1 to 5
- Hold or release a card
- Enter
- Deal or draw
FAQ
- Is this video poker game played for real money?
- No. The table uses play chips that have no value, cannot be bought, and cannot be cashed out or exchanged for anything. If you run out, you are handed another stack for free. There is no account and nothing to download.
- How does the coach know the best hold?
- It does not use a strategy chart. For each of the 32 ways to hold your hand it draws every possible set of replacement cards from the 47 left in the deck, pays each resulting hand by the pay table, and averages them. The hold with the highest average is the best one, and the gap to yours is what your choice gives up.
- Can perfect play beat this machine?
- No. With every hold played correctly, 9/6 Jacks or Better returns 99.54% of the chips bet, a house edge of 0.46%. That is one of the best returns in a casino and it is still below 100%. A machine with a lower full house or flush payout returns less, whatever you hold.
- Why does a session swing so much if the return is that high?
- Because a large part of the return sits in hands that rarely arrive. The royal flush is worth 2.0 points of the 99.54% and comes about once in 40,000 hands. In the sessions where it does not land, which is nearly all of them, the game returns less than its headline figure.
How this game works
Each hand is dealt from one 52-card deck shuffled in your browser so that every ordering is equally likely. Hands are classified and paid by the same code the video poker return calculator uses, on its 9/6 Jacks or Better schedule.
The coach prices all 32 holds of a dealt hand by full enumeration of the remaining 47 cards, with no sampling and no rounding. The 99.54% return and the royal flush figures are read from that calculator's solved game, which applies the same enumeration to every one of the 2,598,960 possible deals.
The expected figure in the session panel is the house edge under best play multiplied by the chips you have bet. What your own holds gave up is reported separately, so the cost of the machine and the cost of mistakes are never mixed.
Limits
- The best hold maximizes the average return. It is not the hold most likely to win this hand, and the two often differ.
- Real machines pay the top royal flush rate only at the maximum bet. This table pays that rate at every bet size.
- Play chips do not feel like money. The long gaps between big hands are harder to sit through with a real stake.
This is a practice game for adults. It has no real-money play and links to none. Video poker played for money has a house edge even when every hold is perfect, and practice only brings you closer to that edge, never past it.
Gambling can cause serious harm. The National Problem Gambling Helpline is free, confidential and open 24/7, call or text 1-800-MY-RESET (1-800-697-3738), or chat at ncpgambling.org/chat.
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