JACKS OR BETTER STRATEGY 9/6 (FULL PAY) Full pay Jacks or Better games are still quite common in downtown Las Vegas or local’s casinos. This game can also be found in most other gaming jurisdictions at moderate to low end casinos as well as most online casinos. Full Pay (9/6) Jacks or Better - 99.54%. Full pay Jacks or Better is the best pay table you can find, and it pays out a maximum of 99.54% if you are using perfect strategy and making the right moves every time. A “9/6 Jacks or Better” game pays out 9 coins for a 1 coin bet on a full house, and 6 coins for a 1 coin bet on a flush. This makes it easy to figure out, because you only have to look at the payout on 2 different hands. (When you’re looking at Deuces Wild, for example, the payouts can vary all over the place for all kinds of different hands.) 8/5 Jacks or Better.
Thinking of trying video poker at Slots of Vegas? Good call. It’s an incredibly fun and exciting version of poker, especially because you can win without having to face off against another player. In 9/6 Jacks or Better, you win when you’re holding a pair of Jacks or anything better.
But you don’t have to play the original hand you’re dealt. Instead you can throw away any or all of your cards and replace them with new ones. Sometimes, however, it can be difficult to know which cards to hold and which ones to throw away.
That’s why we’ve created this handy strategy guide. You’ll notice 36 different hand combinations. To use the strategy sheet, just look for your hand and play it in the way that it’s closest to the top of the chart. Let us explain. Pretend that you’re dealt 4♣,4♦,5♥,6♠,7♣. In this case, you’d keep 4♣,4♦ rather than 4♦,5♥,6♠,7♣. Why? Because a low pair on the chart appears higher than a 4-card straight without any high cards.
To be effective, make sure you search for the highest possible hand on the chart. That’s especially crucial if you’ve got several ways you can play your hand. Take this hand for example. Let’s say you’re dealt 7♣,7♦,10♥,J♥,Q♥. You should keep 10♥,J♥,Q♥ in this instance because your 3-card Royal Flush appears higher up on the chart than that low pair of sevens.
9/6 Jacks Or Better Strategy
Try free video poker at Slots of Vegas so you can get a feel for how this guide works and how effective it really can be.
Jacks or Better video poker offers some of the best odds in the casino. The best version of Jacks or Better video poker, the 9/6 variant, has a payback percentage of 99.5%, which is better for the player than just about any other game in the casino. Even 8/5 Jacks or Better has a payout percentage of 97.3%, which is far worse than a full pay but still far better than most bets on most other casino games.
But in order to enjoy the high payback percentage, you have to play using expert Jacks or Better strategy. The casinos and the manufacturers estimate that players who don’t use an expert strategy are giving up between 2% and 4%, which is a significant amount of money.
How significant?
Consider the average hourly loss of an expert player who’s running true to the mathematical expectation of a game. She’s making 600 wagers per hour at $1.25 per wager, so she’s putting $750 per hour into action. With a house edge of 0.5%, she can expect to lose $3.75 per hour. Assuming she gamblers for ten hours on her trip, she’s got lots of entertainment for just $37.50.
Then let’s take a look at her husband, who ignores expert Jacks or Better video poker strategy and just follows his hunches. (We’ll also assume that his hunches aren’t very good.) He’s losing 4.5% of his bets, which means that he’s losing nine times as much as his wife. At the end of the trip, he’s lost $337.50.
That’s a significant difference.
How to develop an expert Jacks or Better strategy
Computer programs can determine the expected value of any given hand. There are 32 different ways to play any given hand, but only one way has the best expectation for the player. The more often the player chooses to play her hand in that way, the lower the house edge becomes.
But since there are 2.5 million different possible starting hands in video poker, expert strategy groups hands according to types, in order to make the process easier to learn. After all, memorizing 2.5 million different potential decisions is probably impossible unless you’re a machine, but memorizing several types of hands isn’t as hard.
When you consider that 55% of your hands will lose no matter what, you can see that strategy decisions can be narrowed down pretty fast. In fact, a pair of jacks or better will make up 21% of the number of winning hands you get. The small hands, including three of a kind, two pair, and a pair of jacks, make up 70% of the total return on the game.
How to use a Jacks or Better strategy
All Jacks or Better strategy tables consist of a list of hands. The player starts at the top, which is the best possible hand, and then moves down until she finds the hand that she actually has. She then plays it according to the strategy instructions.
Different Jacks or Better strategy charts offer somewhat different instructions. Below I’ve provided one Jacks or Better video poker strategy that’s easy to learn. The house edge against someone using this strategy is only 0.8%, which isn’t as kind to the player as 0.5%, but it’s still considerably better than just about every other game in the casino. And of course, this assumes that you’re playing a full pay, 9/6 Jacks or Better game.
The Jacks or Better Strategy Chart
Jacks Or Better Optimal Strategy
| Keep any 2 pair or better paying combination, UNLESS you also have a 4 card royal flush. If you have a 4 card royal flush, then you’ll always draw to the royal flush. |
| Keep any 4 card straight flush. |
| Keep any pair of jacks or better. |
| Keep any 3 cards to a royal flush. |
| Keep any 4 cards to a flush. |
| Keep any pair lower than jacks or better. |
| Keep any 4 card open straight draw. |
| Keep any unsuited AKQJ. |
| Keep any 2 suited high cards. |
| Keep any 3 cards to a straight flush. |
| Keep any unsuited KQJ. |
| Keep any 2 unsuited high cards. |
| Keep any K, Q, or J if you have a 10 of the same suit. |
| Keep any single high card. |
| Discard all 5 cards and draw a new hand. |
One of the main principles behind most video poker strategies is that you want the machine to deal you a winning hand. If you’re dealt a winning hand, you will very rarely discard any of those cards to draw to something else. The only exception is 4 cards to a royal flush, and that exception is only there because the payout on that hand is so large compared to the other hands.
In fact, you’ll notice that a lot of the Jacks or Better strategy focuses on the royal flush. You’ll only see a royal flush once in every 40,000 or so hands, but the payout makes for a big part of your overall expectation. If you have four cards to a royal flush, you’ll always draw to it. If you have three cards to a royal flush, you’ll always draw to it UNLESS you have a winning combination, in which case you’ll keep the winning cards instead.
A four-card flush draw is better than a low pair, but both of them are better than a straight draw. The reason, again, has to do with the differences in the payouts as compared to the possibility of finishing your hand.
This Jacks or Better strategy requires memorizing 15 lines of rules/guidelines, but it’s far easier than a more advanced strategy. Once you’ve mastered this, you can easily move up to a more advanced strategy with about 21 lines or rules/guidelines, and then you can gain back that additional 0.3%. Play for free or real money today! Put this Jacks or Better video poker strategy into practice and watch your winnings grow!
Video Poker Jacks Or Better Strategy
Interested in trying your hand at other online video poker games? Check out this article on 7 tips to improve your video poker strategy to ensure you play at the top of your game.