Omaha Poker Rules
admin 3/22/2022
- Omaha High - Players and Cards - Deal and Betting - Showdown - Variations
- Five Card Omaha - Six-Card Omaha
- Omaha Poker Rules Hi Lo
- Omaha Hi Poker Rules
- Omaha Poker Rules Video
- Omaha Hi Lo
- Omaha Poker Rules
- Free Omaha Poker No Download
- Omaha Poker Rules And Strategy
All the rules of Omaha apply to Omaha high-low split except as below. A qualifier of 8-or-better for low applies to all high-low split games, unless a specific posting to the contrary is displayed. Omaha poker rules are nearly identical to those of Texas Hold’em poker. The main differences come from the number of hole cards you are dealt – 4 instead of 2, and how you compile your winning hands. However, the are several other notable differences and we will get to them next. In Omaha poker, each player receives 4 hole cards face down. How To Play Omaha Poker. The pre-flop: The initial betting round. Some players (the 'Blinds') are obliged to place a bet while the others can decide wether to call, fold,. The flop: The second betting round. The players still in the hand decide how to act once the dealer places the first three.
Introduction
Omaha is a fairly recent poker variant. It seems that it was first introduced in the 1980's, but it quickly achieved great popularity among casino and tournament players. In Omaha, each player receives four private cards and there are five community cards on the table. In the showdown exactly two private cards together with three community cards must be used to make the player's best hand.
Omaha Poker Rules Hi Lo
This page assumes some familiarity with the general rules and terminology of poker. See the poker rules page for an introduction to these, and the poker betting and poker hand ranking pages for further details.
Omaha High
Players and Cards
From two to ten players can take part. A standard international 52-card pack is used.
The Deal and Betting
Omaha is usually played with no ante, but with blinds. When there are more than two players, the player to dealer's left places a small blind, and the next player to the left a big blind. The big blind is equal to the minimum bet and the small blind is typically half that amount. When there are only two players (a 'heads-up' game), the dealer places the small blind and the non-dealer the big blind. Omaha High is often played with a pot limit betting structure, though other limits are possible - see betting limits for details. 'Pot Limit Omaha' is often abbreviated to PLO.
The cards are shuffled and cut, the dealer 'burns' one card and then deals the cards one at a time face down until each player has four cards. These are known as the player's hole cards or pocket cards. Players may look at their four hole cards and must not show them to any other player.
The first betting round is begun by the player to the left of the big blind. The blinds count as bets, so the small blind need only pay the difference between the blinds to call. The big blind player acts last and is allowed to raise, even if the other active players have all called.
After the first betting round the dealer burns one card and deals three cards face up to the table. These three cards are known as the flop. There is then a second betting round begun by the first active player to the left of the dealer seat.
When the second betting round is complete, the dealer burns a card and then deals one card face up to the table. This card is known as the turn or fourth street. There is then a third betting round, again begun by the first active player to the left of the dealer seat.
After the third betting round the dealer burns another card and deals one more card face up - the river or fifth street. There is fourth and final round of betting before the showdown, again begun by the first active player to the left of the dealer seat.
The Showdown
Active players show all four of their cards in clockwise order, beginning with the who was the last to bet or raise in the final betting round. If everyone checked in the final betting round, the first active player to the left of the dealer seat is the first to show. See the betting and showdown page for further details.
Each player makes the highest possible five-card poker hand using exactly two of their own cards with exactly three of the face-up table cards, which are known as the board.
Note that:
- For a hand to be considered for winning the pot, the player must show all four hole cards, even though only two of them are used to make the best hand.
- The cards speak for themselves: the best hand is entitled to win the pot if shown, even if the owner does not realise that it is the best hand.
- As always, poker hands consist of just five cards. The two unused hole cards and two unused board cards have no bearing on whether one hand is better than another.
Variations
The Swedish variant Sviten Special is described on a separate page.
Omaha High-Low 8 or Better
Omaha is very often played in such a way that the pot is split between the players with the highest and lowest hands. Since a low hand has to have no card higher than 8 to win its share of the pot, the game is called Omaha High-Low Eight or Better or Omaha/8 for short. This is commonly played as a fixed limit game. The deal is the same as in Omaha High, described above, but with fixed limits the size of the bet doubles after the turn card is dealt, so that the third and fourth betting rounds are played with big bets.
At the showdown, each active player makes their highest hand and their lowest hand. Each of these hands must use exactly two hole cards (but not necessarily the same two cards for high and for low) and exactly three board cards (but not necessarily the same three). When making a low hand, the five cards must all be of different ranks, the aces count as low, straights and flushes do not count, and no card can be higher than an 8. So the best low hand is A-2-3-4-5 and the worst is 8-7-6-5-4. Cards are compared from the top down, so 7-5-4-3-2 is better than 7-6-3-2-A because the 5 is lower than the 6.
In this game the cards speak for themselves. This is important because some hands can be quite confusing to read. In a formal game the non-playing dealer will read the hands and tell the players what they have, but in any case it is the duty of all players to try to ensure that the the highest and lowest hands are correctly identified, and to speak up if any hand is wrongly evaluated.
Example: player:
board:
This player has a club flush A-8-6-4-2 for high (not a full house, which would use three hole cards). The low hand is 6-4-3-2-A using the 2 and either a 6 or the 4 from the the player's hand.
Omaha Hi Poker Rules
The pot is split equally between the highest hand and the lowest hand. If players tie for highest or for lowest, that half of the pot is divided equally between them. If none of the active players qualifies for low (which will automatically be the case if there are not three different cards lower than 9 on the board), then the player with the highest hand wins the whole pot.
Other sites
O8 Poker is dedicated to Omaha Hi/Lo 8 or better, giving rules and advice, offering a personal coaching service, and providing brief reviews of some sites where it can be played online.
Five Card Omaha
This is exactly like normal Omaha except that each player is dealt five private cards. As in four-card Omaha, hands are formed of exactly two private cards with exactly three board cards. There are five-card versions of Omaha High and of Omaha/8. These games, and the six-card game below, are sometimes known as Big O.
Six Card Omaha
This is the same as normal Omaha except that each player is dealt six private cards. As usual, hands must use exactly two private cards and three board cards.
Courchevel
This variant is popular in France and has spread to other parts of Europe, including the UK. Five hole cards are dealt to each player and in addition, one card is dealt face up to the table before the first betting round. After the first betting round a card is burned and two more are dealt face up to the table to complete the three-card flop, and there is a second betting round. Then as in normal Omaha a fourth table card (the turn) is dealt face up followed by a third betting round, and a fifth table card (the river) is dealt, followed by a final betting round. In the showdown, players must use exactly two of their five hole cards together with exactly three of the five table cards to make their hand, and the best hand wins the pot.
Binglao
This is a Pot Limit Omaha (PLO) variant that has been played several times in the Norwegian Poker Championship week in Dublin, Ireland. Before each deal the player holding the dealer button rolls a 6-sided die. The result of the roll determines how many private cards will be dealt to each player and whether the game will be High or High-Low 8 or Better.
| Die Roll | Cards per player | Game type |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 4 | PLO High/Low |
| 2 | 5 | PLO High/Low |
| 3 | 6 | PLO High/Low |
| 4 | 4 | PLO High |
| 5 | 5 | PLO High |
| 6 | 6 | PLO High |
In tournamentsthe game is often listed as 'Binglao 6 max' which probably means that not more than 6 players are allowed at a table, though it would in fact be possible for 7 people to play without running out of cards.
Omaha Poker Rules Video
The Basic Rules of Pot Limit Omaha (PLO)
Omaha is a poker variant in which each player is dealt four “hole” cards (cards that the other players can’t see) and then share a five card board. It is similar to Hold’em in its play, with flop, turn, and river cards dealt in succession on the board, interspersed with betting rounds. The most common betting structure for Omaha is Pot Limit, in which players can only bet the size of the pot, including their call.
Omaha Hi Lo
The play begins with each player being dealt four cards. Unlike Hold’em, players must play exactly two cards from their hand and exactly three from the board. Hand rankings are the same in Omaha and Hold’em, with a high card being the worst and a royal flush the best possible hand.
In PLO, the play starts with a small and big blind, which rotates each turn. The first player after the big blind (Under the Gun – UTG) may fold, call the big blind, or raise up to the “pot limit.” If the blinds are $1 and $2, the UTG player can bet up to $7. Things then get a little tricky. The second player can now fold, call the $7 or bet up to $24. This betting structure takes a while to get used to. See our How to Calculate Pot Limit article for more examples. When in doubt, if you would like to bet the maximum, you can always announce that you bet “pot” and the dealer will figure out the amount for you.
Omaha Poker Rules
Note that starting hand values are quite different than in Hold’em, so you’ll want to familiarize yourself with these differences before playing Omaha. The “Advice” button in our PLO simulator can help you with this.
Hand equities run much closer together in Omaha, and thus more players will generally stay to see the flop than in Hold’em. With the ability to select the best two of a four card hand, winning hands in Omaha also tend to be quite strong. Single pairs and two pairs are rarely likely to take down the pot, and players should be drawing to nut straights and flushes if they decide to draw.
As you might imagine, Omaha pots can grow quite big, and with pre-flop hand equity advantages rarely larger than 60% variance swings in PLO can be big as well. The PLO player will need a larger bankroll than the typical No-Limit Hold’em player for that reason.