Types of Casino Poker

Hello, I was wondering if anyone had information regarding what types of poker are played in casinos (in North America and globally)?

Obviously Texas Hold’Em is the most popular, but I have seen other casinos have Omaha Hold’Em and Seven Card Stud. But are there any others (played in casinos)?

I’ve anecdotally read that it’s easier to make money in Omaha than Texas because the players are less skilled on average. Wondering if that’s the same for Seven Card Stud or other games. I have never played poker in a casino because I am not good (yet), but I’m interested in learning about Omaha and maybe other variants played in casinos if anyone has resources that they would recommend.

Thanks very much for reading and have a great Thursday

Quote: harris

Hello, I was wondering if anyone had information regarding what types of poker are played in casinos (in North America and globally)?

Obviously Texas Hold’Em is the most popular, but I have seen other casinos have Omaha Hold’Em and Seven Card Stud. But are there any others (played in casinos)?

I’ve anecdotally read that it’s easier to make money in Omaha than Texas because the players are less skilled on average. Wondering if that’s the same for Seven Card Stud or other games. I have never played poker in a casino because I am not good (yet), but I’m interested in learning about Omaha and maybe other variants played in casinos if anyone has resources that they would recommend.

Thanks very much for reading and have a great Thursday
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My experience may be different but I found Omaha players to generally be better players because most of them were more experienced as most players start with Hold'em and then graduate to other games.

I played Omaha and 7-card stud during one visit about 20+ years ago. I doubt those games are still offered but I have no idea. I grew up playing 7 card stud, and I have better luck on Omaha than on Texas Hold'em. I like limit play instead of pot limit or whatever it's called, all-in; because I don't want to go broke quick. Rakes were a big disadvantage for the lowest limit games back then, it's probably much worse now. Probably have to find a $5/$10 game to afford the rake nowadays.

Stud and Draw are OG games and are hard to find. I *think* Orleans has them on a regular basis.

HoldEm became the most popular game because between the Moneymaker boom and Black Friday, there was a lot of poker on TV, almost all of it was HoldEm. After Black Friday, the TV coverage has been reduced, but HoldEm is still the most popular when on TV.

As a result, that's what most people learn first, and is often the only game offered in smaller poker rooms.

Omaha is the dominant #2 game because of its similarities to HoldEm. You get 4 cards, but must play exactly 2 of them at showdown.

Also, lately, a lot of poker rooms that offer both, are playing a single hand of Omaha on their HoldEm tables on every dealer change, so it's starting to gain interest. (If at the table, you can decline to play the hand. It will only be played if most people are in.) When it is played, it's often as a bomb pot and/or double board. (Bomb pots are where everyone puts in a set amount of about 5x the big blind before getting cards. Double boards are a split game where there will be 2 flops, 2 turns and 2 rivers and half the pot goes to the winner of each board. You don't have to play the same 2 on each board.)

Big-O is a 5 card version of Omaha but everything else is the same (I.E. You play exactly 2 hole cards and 3 board cards). Then there's Omaha-6. Yep, 6 hole cards and everything else the same.

Omaha-8 is a split pot game where half the pot is low-ball.

Pineapple where you get 3 cards and must discard 1 before the flop. Everything else is the same as HoldEm. Crazy Pineapple is the same, but you discard after the flop. (I may have that backwards.) Then there's Lazy Pineapple where you don't discard, but can't play all 3 cards.

Razz is a low-ball version of Draw.

Badugi is a 4 card low-ball draw game.

There are probably some I'm forgetting.

Plus weird combinations/variants such as Omadugi which is a split game where half the pot is played as Omaha, the other half is a stud version of Badugi using all 4 hole cards.

I'm sure there are more.

Unfortunately, most of these games are not offered on a regular basis but DO pop up during WSOP season.


And these are just the poker room games. There are endless varieties of house banked games played against a dealer and/or pay table that are based on poker.

There are so many Indian casinos, they should deal Indian poker. They can give everyone a special visor with a place to put the card, and a girl in a Sexy Squaw costume comes around and puts a card in everyone's visor before giving the deck back to the dealer and he completes the game.

I've only seen 7 card stud, Texas hold-em, Omaha and Omaha high-low dealt in casinos, and from what I see they are moving away from stud. It takes longer to deal and it's not as familiar to casual players because it's not promoted on TV. I've heard that 5-card stud and 5-card draw are also legal casino games but I don't think anyone has dealt them in many years.

in the 2000s atleast some Finish casinos offered Scandinavian Stud (Also called Canadian stud) I dont know if it still offered.

It's 5-card stud, but a 4-flush or a 4-straight beats one pair, a 4-flush beats a 4-straight.

Very interesting, thanks for the information, I’ve never heard of that one

I was going to start a thread to ask questions about it, but there is a game called Run 'Em Twice. Caesars has it and among a handful of other casinos I can find docs for Hard Rock as well. I'm coming up empty with much in terms of data or strategy if any exist, I tried digging through WOO without any luck. It has an interesting layout, wondering if it's got any interesting stats to go with it.

I got you Valleyguy85

Basically Run 'Em Twice is exactly like an existing game called Criss Cross Poker.

When I first saw it earlier this year, I was confused and found nothing about it online, but it's literally just Criss Cross Poker with no differences that I am aware of.

Thank you! This gives me more to dig into. Much appreciated!

I saw an Australian casino list "Filipino Poker" and "Faro Poker" on their website. I assume Faro Poker just refers to the game Faro, or does it?

Source: ACT Legislation Register https://share.google/tL3o03SW0xZrbX7Bd

"Faro Poker" seems to be a very different game.

Quote: Dieter

Source: ACT Legislation Register https://share.google/tL3o03SW0xZrbX7Bd

"Faro Poker" seems to be a very different game.
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It mostly appears to be standard poker with a shortened deck; i.e., at the option of the casino operator it is a 48 card game with the deuces removed, or a 44 card game with the 2s and 3s removed or a 40 card game with the 2s, 3s and 4s removed. With a shortened deck flushes are ranked higher than a full house. The casino operator can also decide that a wild card can be added to the deck.

Quote: gordonm888

Quote: Dieter

Source: ACT Legislation Register https://share.google/tL3o03SW0xZrbX7Bd

"Faro Poker" seems to be a very different game.
link to original post

It mostly appears to be standard poker with a shortened deck; i.e., at the option of the casino operator it is a 48 card game with the deuces removed, or a 44 card game with the 2s and 3s removed or a 40 card game with the 2s, 3s and 4s removed. With a shortened deck flushes are ranked higher than a full house. The casino operator can also decide that a wild card can be added to the deck.
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I hadn't noticed the option of a shortened deck.
Each player gets dealt 5 cards.
There are 5 community cards, dealt one at a time. (No flop.)
Hands are ranked based on 2 hole cards plus 3 from the board.

In any case, not Faro.

Quote: Dieter

Quote: gordonm888

Quote: Dieter

Source: ACT Legislation Register https://share.google/tL3o03SW0xZrbX7Bd

"Faro Poker" seems to be a very different game.
link to original post

It mostly appears to be standard poker with a shortened deck; i.e., at the option of the casino operator it is a 48 card game with the deuces removed, or a 44 card game with the 2s and 3s removed or a 40 card game with the 2s, 3s and 4s removed. With a shortened deck flushes are ranked higher than a full house. The casino operator can also decide that a wild card can be added to the deck.
link to original post

I hadn't noticed the option of a shortened deck.
Each player gets dealt 5 cards.
There are 5 community cards, dealt one at a time. (No flop.)
Hands are ranked based on 2 hole cards plus 3 from the board.

In any case, not Faro.
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Thanks, I had missed some of that. Without the shortened deck, those rules are the same as a variant of Omaha called Omaha 5. Its the same as Omaha except the players are dealt 5 cards rather than four cards.

Quote: gordonm888

Quote: Dieter

Quote: gordonm888

Quote: Dieter

Source: ACT Legislation Register https://share.google/tL3o03SW0xZrbX7Bd

"Faro Poker" seems to be a very different game.
link to original post

It mostly appears to be standard poker with a shortened deck; i.e., at the option of the casino operator it is a 48 card game with the deuces removed, or a 44 card game with the 2s and 3s removed or a 40 card game with the 2s, 3s and 4s removed. With a shortened deck flushes are ranked higher than a full house. The casino operator can also decide that a wild card can be added to the deck.
link to original post

I hadn't noticed the option of a shortened deck.
Each player gets dealt 5 cards.
There are 5 community cards, dealt one at a time. (No flop.)
Hands are ranked based on 2 hole cards plus 3 from the board.

In any case, not Faro.
link to original post

Thanks, I had missed some of that. Without the shortened deck, those rules are the same as a variant of Omaha called Omaha 5. Its the same as Omaha except the players are dealt 5 cards rather than four cards.
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I'm sure the short deck helps keep every round engaging at a small table.

Also, the no flop board is very unusual - one card at a time. Two more betting rounds is very unusual.

The Canadian (Scandanavian) Stud I played in Canada home ganes would somtimes include 4-Straight-Flush beats a Full House. Usually all of these games were last card down.

In my experience, in casinos you can actually find Omaha more often and sometimes Stud, but the fields are very different. By the way, I also watch online games to practice. I think Omaha is really easier to start than it seems.

Quote: Whaver

In my experience, in casinos you can actually find Omaha more often and sometimes Stud, but the fields are very different. By the way, I also watch online games to practice. I think Omaha is really easier to start than it seems.
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In Omaha, the difference between most good hands and most bad hands is much smaller than in Hold'em Fewer people fold pre-flop after looking at their cards and there tends to be more ALL-iN moments. So this ;leads to more betting and hence a higher rake for Omaha than for Hold'em.

Has anyone here seen Greek Hold'em in real life? It's just Omaha Poker but instead of getting 4 cards you get 2.

I wonder if anyone has tried making a table game based on Greek Hold'em. A possible advantage is that it would definitely have less pushes than other poker-based games (for example, with optimal strategy, you will push over 3% of the time in UTH... probably not that big of a deal but I assume that casinos would like to minimize pushing in non-Pai Gow related games)

Interesting! I'd never heard of Greek Hold'em. Would be an interesting game to try out in a home game.

Other games I've seen in casinos are HORSE (five poker games) at South Point Casino in Las Vegas, and Pineapple (or was it Crazy Pineapple?) at … I forgot where, but it was definitely in either Reno or Vegas.

Yeah, Hold’em is still king pretty much everywhere. Omaha is growing a lot though, and some players actually prefer it because there’s more action. Stud games still exist but feel a bit old school now. If you’re curious about Omaha, maybe try low stakes first to get used to it.

Quote: HighStakesJoe

Yeah, Hold’em is still king pretty much everywhere. Omaha is growing a lot though, and some players actually prefer it because there’s more action. Stud games still exist but feel a bit old school now. If you’re curious about Omaha, maybe try low stakes first to get used to it.
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Omaha is a good game but it has some structural flaws. Most pre-flop hands are playable so the strategy that has evolved in No-limit Omaha is to jam (go all-in) in many pre-flop and post flop situations. To limit this, many games are defined as Pot-limit Omaha, which involves having to count the pot when a player wants to max bet. Anyway, when everyone is going all-in or Max-bet all the time the game becomes boring.

Recently I started investigating this again and I found a helpful website called PokerAtlas. I cannot verify how correct it is because I do not live near a casino with poker.

On this website, I found evidence of "Big O" (Omaha with 5 cards) being played in Atlantic City, Las Vegas, and other places.

Additionally, I have heard, but not seen evidence, that Tahoe Poker is being played near Tahoe. It's like Texas Hold'Em but everyone gets three cards. Does anyone know if this is true? I go to Tahoe every year so I would be interested in playing if this is still offered in real life. I didn't find any evidence on this website.

The website also states that Pineapple and Crazy Pineapple can be found in Alberta. These games are like Texas Hold'Em but you receive three cards and discard one of them before the Pre-Flop and Turn respectively.

Final questions:

When casinos say they have stud poker, is it safe to assume they always mean 7-card stud?

Also, would anyone be interested in me adding varieties of poker to my website?

Tahoe? As in Lake Tahoe?

The only place I know to play poker at Lake Tahoe is at Caesars Republic (formerly Harvey's). They offer only the usual limit and no-limit Hold'em games. I think they used to have Omaha and Stud games on the board, but those games rarely ran. (Tahoe Poker looks like another fun home variant for home games!) What's your website again?

And yes, when it's stud poker, it's going to be 7-card stud—unless you're playing aboard the USS Enterprise-D.

Yes, Lake Tahoe :)

My website is here. Would you be interested in being able to play 1v1 against a poker AI on my website if that was an option?

Also, is 5-card Draw played anywhere to anyone's knowledge?

Thanks

If you are talking about multiplayer games in poker rooms, these are all over the casinos in the US. Also, the World Series of Poker and the World Poker Tour offer medium to high stakes games that travel around the country.

If you are describing table games, then that is something different.

Conventional poker can be very boring when played one on one. The drama in poker arises from situations when there are two or more high ranking hands on the same deal. This occurs very infrequently when it is a 2-person game which is why poker games have 6 or 9 or 10 players at a table.

Quote: gordonm888

Omaha is a good game but it has some structural flaws. Most pre-flop hands are playable so the strategy that has evolved in No-limit Omaha is to jam (go all-in) in many pre-flop and post flop situations. To limit this, many games are defined as Pot-limit Omaha, which involves having to count the pot when a player wants to max bet. Anyway, when everyone is going all-in or Max-bet all the time the game becomes boring.
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The last time I played PLO, which was quite a few years ago, it was part of a mixed game. We alternated between PLO and NLHE. The stakes were the same, but I was surprised that the PLO pots were consistently larger than the NLHE pots.

I am surprised that Pot Limit Omaha is being discussed as if it was an obscure game. It is quite popular in Texas, not as popular as hold ‘em but clearly number two. It seems to be a favorite among big money players. In Texas virtually every live hold em game deals periodic double board PLO bomb pots, typically every dealer change and people love them. I think PLO might eventually overtake hold ‘em. I’m thinking I need to learn PLO strategy.

After some searching, I couldn't find anything new other than "Omaha-6" which is played in the UK

Quote: harris

Recently I started investigating this again and I found a helpful website called PokerAtlas. I cannot verify how correct it is because I do not live near a casino with poker.
link to original post

PokerAtlas also has poker room management software. IE. Waitlists, tournament timers and seat assignments, etc. Kinda like Bravo.

It also has an app where players can see what games are available, click to get on the waitlist, info about the room and tourneys, etc.

It ALSO has room and tourney info for casinos that don’t use the software, but that info is sometimes out of date.

By contrast, Bravo has less info about the rooms, and it only has it for those that use their software.

I think PokerAtlas is better because the info portion is formatted and presented the same way for every casino.

Bravo is very free form and can be wordy and redundant.

It appears there is another poker game called Super Stud which can be found in Deadwood but maybe elsewhere - It is a Stud Poker game where you start with 5 cards - 4 down and 1 up

I was thinking of developing a notation to describe poker games, in a similar way to how checkers notation has rules to indication what type of game you are playing. After documenting all the checkers games around the world, I realized that a similar notation could be built for Poker.

Let me give an example of a Pot Limit 6-Card Hi/Lo Omaha game
[C;PL;HL8;6D;3C;1C;1C;O2]
this stands for "community card (as opposed to draw or stud), pot limit, hi/lo (with 8 as opposed to 9 in rare cases), receive 6 face-down, reveal 3 community cards, reveal 1 community card, reveal 1 community card, make the best hand with 2 of your own"

Let me give an example for a No Limit Razz game too

[S;NL;RZ;2D1U;1U;1U;1U;1D]

this stands for "stud (as opposed to draw or community card), no limit, razz, receive 2 face-down and 1 face-up, receive 1 face up (repeated x3), and receive one face-down"

Maybe my system is imperfect but what do you think?
It could help people describe new games, or help people understand existing ones.

This notation could include the big/small blind amount in the future, describe stripped decks, or be extended to show actual gameplay in the same way that chess/checkers notation does.

Anyways look forward to your constructive criticism and ideas. I will be the first to admit that I do not know so much about poker :)

First, you may wish to surf the Two Plus Two Poker forum/website to see how the enormous existing poker community refers to their games. Also look at the World Series of Poker website to see the 100+ games they offer in their big annual summer event and in their traveling circuit.

Think of there being at least two distinct things to describe:

The game (5 card/7card/8card/); Stud, Draw, Double draw, Holdem, Omaha, Badugi, Low, Razz, high-low, short deck, up cards vs down cards, wild cards
and
The Betting (NL, Limit, Pot Limit, Bomb Pot) and (Cash vs tournament vs turbo tournament)

There is an 8 card poker game (!) where you make two three card hands and a two card hand, popular in Asia, online

There are hold'em variants in which you receive 3 hole cards and may use all 0-3 in your 5 card hand, alternatively where you must use exactly 2 of 3 hole cards in your 5 card hand.

I used to play Low (5 low) Double Draw poker in California Casinos several time a week. before the laws changed (allowing standard high poker)

After some more research, I realized the question I should have initially asked is, "what games are allowed in Dealer's Choice poker around the world?"

So far I have just found a few lists of acceptable Dealer's Choice poker games

The Lodge Poker Club has some interesting one's mentioned, though this might not be their full list.
Dramaha is like 5-Card Omaha Poker but you can discard/re-draw after the flop.
There is both Five-card Single and Triple Draw in the "2-7 Lowball" format.

The WSOP Dealer's Choice tournament doesn't really have anything that I haven't mentioned so far.

Does anyone have other lists of allowed Dealer's Choice variants with poker-types that I am missing?

I have intentionally omitted Badugi, Badeucy, and Badacey, because I view these games as "related but too different from poker", what do you think?

Quote: harris

I have intentionally omitted Badugi, Badeucy, and Badacey, because I view these games as "related but too different from poker", what do you think?
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The table game called high-card flush is considered to be a poker variant; similarly Badugi is universally considered to be a multi-player poker variant.

In home games (which is where most poker is played) there are wild card games - Pineapple, Baseball, etc., - and games like Pass the Trash where you pass cards to other players. (a little similar to Hearts).

There's a variant to seven card stud games called "roll your own" where the first three cards are dealt face down and the player chooses which card will be face-up.

There is also a seven card stud variant where the rank of the players first face-up card becomes wild but only for that specific player.

I slightly disagree with the idea that house-banked table games can be poker-variants, even though my website implies they are. I think they are poker-based. Additionally, I do not think that high card flush is not poker-based. On my website it is not included in the 3-card, 4-card, or 5-card poker categories because hands like "pair", "full house" and "straight" do not really matter in that game. Does anyone else have thoughts on this?

For now I will reluctantly force myself to accept that Badugi is a poker variant, even though the hand rankings are extremely different and you make a 4-card hand. Mostly because it's used in the WSOP Dealer's Choice and because gordonm888 and Wikipedia say so, two sources I greatly respect.

This brings up the question: what is Poker? Is any game where you are betting on having a better hand that your opponents poker? Are Teen Patti and Three Card Brag poker or just related games?

Sorry to get super technical about classifications of poker games, as you might be able to tell I broke up with my girlfriend which has let me dedicate more time to esoteric topics such as Niu Niu variations lol :D

Final question: Does anyone know if five-card stud cash games are still played anywhere, even in the form of an option at Dealer's Choice? I found that a casino in California regularly has a related game called Mexican Poker.

I have only seen 5-card stud in old movies, usually B&W movies of the wild west. The movie depictions with 4 to 5 people all betting on their formidable poker hands until showdown (and often with 4oaK beating a full house) are simply fantasy. It's a very boring game that is structured poorly.

I forgot to mention that the new game “Tennessee Hold’Em” is played in a couple places in England from what I can find online - it could be played elsewhere in 2026 I don’t know.

It’s notably the only type of poker that’s copyrighted. Time will tell if such a model can succeed. I assume someone could just call the game Kentucky Hold’Em and play it in their own casino, right?

It appears there is a game called Mata Ases that’s become really popular in Mexico.

It’s like a stud game with 3 community of which you’re allowed to use one.

There are some details online, I’m going to read more about it