What Are Community Cards in Poker?

How many community cards are there in a poker game?

And how do you use community cards in poker?

Community cards are cards that are dealt into the center of the table – they’re also often called “the board.”

When you’re creating your final hand at the showdown, you use a combination of the cards in your hand and the community cards to create your final 5-card hand.

Most poker games that use community cards are holdem games – Texas holdem, Omaha, and Pineapple are all examples of holdem games.

In this post, I explain what community cards in poker are and how to use them.

Community Card Poker Games

Any game of poker that uses community cards is a community card poker game. In such a game, multiple cards are dealt into the middle of the table. All the players have these same cards in their hands. That’s why they’re community cards.

The cards in your individual hand are called “hole cards.” In any community card poker game, you won’t have enough hole cards to create a single 5-card hand. This means that your hole cards make up an “incomplete hand.”

In poker games played in cardrooms, the community cards are dealt in a row in the middle of the table and are called the board.

In many home games, though, the community cards might be dealt into a special pattern like a cross or a 3 X 3 grid. My father-in-law loved to play community card games with a variety of patterns in the middle of the table.

The most popular community card poker game, of course, is Texas holdem.

Betting and Showdowns in Community Card Poker Games

In most community card poker games played in casinos – like Texas holdem – the action is driven by forced bets called blinds. In home games, antes are also common.

A blind, on the other hand, rotates around the table. You only must make a blind bet when it’s your turn to, and that rotates around the table. Blinds are normally of 2 sizes – the big blind and the small blind. The small blind is usually half the amount of the big blind, and the big blind is usually the same size as the betting minimums during the early betting rounds of the game.

Community card poker games are often played high-only – especially Texas holdem. This means that at the showdown, the highest possible hand wins the pot.

Some community card poker games are often played in high-low format, which means that the high hand splits the pot with the low hand. This is common in Omaha, especially.

How Community Cards Work in Texas Holdem and Its Variations

In Texas holdem, each player gets 2 hole cards. After a round of betting, the board gets dealt 3 cards face-up. This is called the flop. After another round of betting, the board gets an additional card (the turn). After another round of betting, another card (the river) gets dealt.

Texas holdem players can use any combination of their 2 hole cards and the 5 community cards to make their 5-card hand. In other words, you could use 2 cards from your hand and 3 cards from the board, 1 card from your hand and 4 cards from the board, or just use all 5 cards on the board to make your final hand at the showdown.

Most variations of Texas holdem have different names, and the big difference has to do with how many hole cards you get.

For example, in Omaha, you get 4 hole cards instead of 2, but you also have another wrinkle – you must use 2 cards from your hole cards and 3 cards from the board to make your hand. You cannot use any other combination of cards.

In Pineapple, you get 3 hole cards instead of 2. What happens with those hole cards is what determines which variation of Pineapple you’re playing. In standards Pineapple, you discard 1 of your 3 hole cards before the betting rounds begin.

In Crazy Pineapple, though, you get to hang on to all 3 cards until you see the flop. At that point, you must discard 1 of your 3 hole cards.

The final variation is called Lazy Pineapple, and you get to keep all 3 cards until the showdown.

Double Board Holdem and Cincinnati

One fun way to play Texas holdem at home is to play “double board” holdem.

In this variation, instead of just having a board, you have 2 board.

At the end of the game, you use one board to determine the winner of half the pot.

You use the other board to determine the winner of the other half the pot.

One of my father-in-law’s favorite community card variants is called Cincinnati. The game starts with 4 hole cards, and then 4 hole cards are dealt face down in the center of the table.

To turn over community cards, you must place a bet, and each betting round, you get to turn over a single card, from left to right.

The big wrinkle, though, is this:

The dealer gets to choose 1 of the 4 community cards to make wild – but he does this while the cards are still face-down.

I’ve also seen Cincinnati played with 5 hole cards and 5 community cards.

You can use any combination of the cards in your hand and the community cards to make your best hand at the showdown. We always played with antes, but I know some people play Cincinnati with blinds. The game works well played in limit formats and in pot limit format.

My Favorite Community Card Poker Game – Death Wheel

You’ll have a hard time finding a poker game with a better name than “Death Wheel.” I don’t care how lousy the rules are. I want to play that game.

In Death Wheel, you get 4 hole cards, and there are 6 face-down community cards dealt in a circle for the board. You use 3 cards from the board and 2 of the cards in your hand to form your final hand.

Also, the order that the community cards are flipped over is different than in other games. You still have to place a bet to flip a card over, but the cards must be turned over in a specific order. You must flip over the card opposite the one that was just flipped over.

Death Wheel is also a high-low game – the highest hand splits the pot with the lowest hand.

What Other Poker Game Types Are There?

I’m aware that some of my readers might be unfamiliar with any variation of poker that doesn’t involve community cards. After all, in the United States, “poker” and “Texas holdem” are practically synonymous.

But a few decades ago, most poker games didn’t involve community cards.

The 2 big poker game variations that don’t use community cards are draw poker and stud poker.

In a draw poker game, you get a certain number of cards, then you get to discard and replace some of those cards during a drawing round. In most draw poker games, all your cards are face down most of the time.

In a stud poker game, you also get a certain number of cards, but the cards you get are the cards you play. There is no discarding and replacing in stud poker.

Also, in stud poker, some of the cards are dealt face down, while other cards are dealt face up. The variation has much to do with this, although some variations have sub-variations.

For example, in 7-card stud, you start with 3 cards. Your first 2 cards are dealt face-down, and your 3rd card is dealt face up. There’s a betting round after that, and then you get one more card followed by one more betting round until you have 7 cards. These cards are each dealt face up until the final card, which is always dealt face-down.

Conclusion

What are community cards in poker?

They’re just cards that are dealt in the center of the table that are shared by all the players at the table.

Most modern poker players are familiar with community card poker because of the popularity of Texas holdem.

But there are a lot of variations beyond just those.