Razz Poker, Rules and how to play

Find everything you need to know in order to enjoy a game of Razz poker, the rules, the game structure and how to form winning hands

Razz poker shares many characteristics with Stud poker, so if you do not know the rules of Stud then you should recap on them first.
There are very few differences between 7 Card Stud Poker and Razz, the only differences occur in the following areas:

• Which player must bring in the action at the beginning of the first betting round.
• On any given street, which player must start the action
• Which hand wins at the showdown
The Bring
As soon as each player have received their two down cards and a door card it is time for one player to bring it in.

1. The difference between Stud and Razz is that in Razz the player who has the highest value door card is required to bring.
2. Door cards are ranked by their face values from lowest to highest, jack, queen, king.
3. In Razz the highest value card is the king. Aces count as low, which is good. If two players are tied on the highest cards, the suit of the door card will decide the tie.
4. Suits are ordered alphabetically from worst to best: Clubs, Diamonds, Hearts, Spades.
• Like in Stud, the player who is bringing has to bring to choices:
• Place a bet equal to the ante
• Bet the full amount of the small bet, thereby completing the bet.
The Betting Rounds
In a Razz game, the player who has the best Razz hand, i.e. the lowest value cards, starts the action on a betting round.
In Razz a pair is high, for example, if one player has a king and queen of spades and the other has a pair of twos, the pair of twos has the weaker hand. A hand is as low as the value of its highest card.
The player with the best hand starts the betting round. This player has two options:
• Check (the same as a call, but there is not yet a bet to match)
• Bet Showdown After the final betting round, the showdown takes place in which the players form the best five card hand they can out of their seven cards.
Evaluating Hands
The winning hand is determined by the following:
• The lowest hand at the table always wins in a game of Razz
• Flushes and Straights do not count in Razz. This means the best hand possible is the lowest straight (the wheel) A-2-3-4-5.
• Hands are judged by their highest card; therefore A-2-3-4-8 is worse than 3-4-5-6-7.
• The pot can be split between two or more players if they tie.