Ultimate texas holdem: rules, strategy chart and house edge

Key facts

You post an ante and an equal blind, then can bet 3x or 4x before the flop, 2x after it, or 1x on the river. You make one play bet per hand at most, and folding forfeits the ante and blind.
With perfect strategy the house edge is 2.19% of the ante in our exact calculation, using the blind table in the Queensland and ACT rules.
Raise 4x before the flop with 37.7% of starting hands: any pair from 3-3 up, any ace, any suited king, K-5 offsuit or better, Q-6 suited, Q-8 offsuit, J-8 suited or better, and J-10 offsuit. In our calculation a 3x raise is never the best choice.
Strategy is worth a lot here: always raising 4x costs 40.7% of the ante, and never betting before the river costs 32.0%.
The optional Trips bet has a 3.50% house edge on the Queensland and ACT paytable.

Ultimate texas holdem, the short version

Ultimate texas holdem is hold'em against the dealer where you choose when to make your one big bet. Bet early and you can bet up to four times your ante; wait and the most you can bet shrinks to 2x on the flop and 1x on the river. Play the chart below and the game costs 2.19% of your ante in our exact calculation, which makes it one of the cheaper table games, if you use the early raise.

Rules, step by step

These follow Queensland's Casino Gaming Rule (schedule 11(a)) and the ACT's 2025 approval for Casino Canberra, which match on every point below.

Bets. Place an ante and a blind of the same amount. Trips is optional.
Deal. You and the dealer each get two hole cards; five community cards are set out face down.
Before the flop: check, or make a play bet of 3 or 4 times the ante.
After the flop: if you have not bet, check or bet 2 times the ante.
After the turn and river: if you still have not bet, bet 1 times the ante or fold (losing ante and blind). Queensland's rules also let you fold before or after the flop, but checking costs nothing, so an early fold never helps.
Dealer qualifies with a pair or better. If not, your ante is a push; the play and blind bets are still settled.
Settle. Your best five card hand against the dealer's. The play bet pays 1 to 1 if you win. The ante pays 1 to 1 if the dealer qualified. The blind pays from its table only if you win with a straight or better; a lower winning hand pushes the blind. Lose, and every bet in action loses.

Hand	Blind (only if you beat the dealer)	Trips (your hand only)
Royal flush	500 to 1	50 to 1
Straight flush	50 to 1	40 to 1
Four of a kind	10 to 1	30 to 1
Full house	3 to 1	8 to 1
Flush	3 to 2	7 to 1
Straight	1 to 1	4 to 1
Three of a kind	push	3 to 1
Lower winning hand	push	loses

The Trips bet pays on your final seven card hand whatever the dealer holds. It wins 15.3% of the time and has a 3.50% house edge in our calculation, a little more expensive than the main game.

Ultimate texas holdem strategy: the preflop chart

We solved the game exactly: every two card start, every flop, every turn and river, and every dealer hand, choosing the best of check, 2x or 1x at each later step. The result for the first decision:

Raise 4x before the flop with:

Hand type	Raise with
Pairs	3-3 and higher (check 2-2)
Any ace	A-2 and higher, suited or not
King, suited	Any suited king (K-2 suited and up)
King, offsuit	K-5 and higher
Queen, suited	Q-6 and higher
Queen, offsuit	Q-8 and higher
Jack, suited	J-8 and higher
Jack, offsuit	J-10 only

Check everything else, including all hands without an ace, king, queen or jack apart from pairs. That is 500 of the 1,326 possible starting combinations raised, or 37.7%.

Two examples from our results show how big the swing is. With pocket aces, a 4x raise is worth plus 3.60 units on average against plus 2.19 for checking. With 7-6 suited, a 4x raise averages minus 0.75 while checking averages minus 0.14. Straight-and-flush potential is not enough on its own: 10-9 suited is a check.

After the flop: bet 2x or check

If you checked before the flop, you can now bet twice the ante. Our worked examples, in units of the ante:

Your cards	Flop	Bet 2x	Check (then best river play)	Decision
10♦ 9♣	10♥ 5♠ 2♦ (top pair)	plus 1.31	plus 0.75	Bet 2x
8♥ 7♦	K♠ 8♣ 4♦ (middle pair)	plus 0.79	plus 0.38	Bet 2x
7♥ 5♦	K♣ Q♠ 5♥ (bottom pair)	plus 0.03	minus 0.17	Bet 2x
9♥ 7♥	K♥ 4♥ 2♣ (low flush draw)	plus 0.10	plus 0.19	Check
J♥ 7♣	9♠ 8♦ 2♣ (gutshot)	minus 0.91	minus 0.69	Check
2♣ 2♦	K♥ 8♠ 3♣ (pair of twos)	minus 0.87	minus 0.79	Check

In our examples, every pair that used one of your hole cards was worth the 2x bet, even bottom pair, except pocket twos. The draws were not.

On the river: bet 1x or fold

This is the decision players get wrong in the other direction. Folding costs you the ante and blind, so you should bet 1x whenever its average result beats minus 2. Out of the 990 possible dealer hands, here is how many beat you in each case:

Your cards	Board	Dealer hands that beat you	Bet 1x	Decision
10♥ 9♠	10♦ 6♣ 4♥ 3♠ 2♦	317	plus 0.07	Bet
6♥ 6♣	A♠ K♦ Q♥ 8♣ 2♦	505	minus 0.93	Bet
4♥ 4♣	K♦ J♠ 9♣ 7♥ 2♠	533	minus 1.06	Bet
Q♥ 9♣	K♦ 7♠ 4♣ 3♥ 2♦	741	minus 1.89	Bet
J♥ 8♣	K♦ 9♠ 6♣ 4♥ 2♦	817	minus 2.10	Fold
9♦ 7♣	K♥ Q♠ 8♣ 4♦ 2♥	861	minus 2.22	Fold

The Q-9 hand loses to three dealer hands in four, yet betting still beats folding, because when the dealer fails to qualify your ante pushes instead of losing.

Pundit tip: most of the game's value comes before the flop. In our calculation, never betting until the river (but playing the river perfectly) costs 32.0% of your ante, against 2.19% with the full strategy. If you learn one thing, learn the chart.

What strategy is worth

Approach	House edge on the ante
Perfect strategy (chart, then best flop and river decisions)	2.19%
Wait for the river every hand, then play it perfectly	32.0%
Raise 4x before the flop with every hand	40.7%

At a $10 ante and $10 blind, perfect play costs about 22 cents per hand on average. The swings are much larger than that number suggests, because a 4x raise puts $60 in action on one hand.

Where it fits, and the law

Ultimate texas holdem uses ordinary texas holdem rules for hand forming and the standard poker hand rankings. Among the house-banked poker games we have calculated, only casino holdem is cheaper, at 2.16% of the ante with a single decision.

In Australia it is a casino floor game: Queensland's rule book and the ACT's 2025 approval both set out its rules. Online, it counts as a casino-style game, and offering those to people in Australia breaches the Interactive Gambling Act 2001. Players are not prosecuted, but offshore operators answer to no Australian regulator. Our online poker Australia page explains more. A big 4x raise is exactly when to remember your limit; support is on the gambling help australia page.

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Frequently asked questions

How do you play ultimate texas holdem?

Bet an ante and an equal blind (plus optional Trips). You and the dealer get two cards. You may bet 3 or 4 times the ante before the flop, twice the ante after the flop, or once the ante after the river; if you have not bet by the river you can fold. The dealer needs a pair to qualify for the ante to be in action.

What is the best ultimate texas holdem strategy?

Raise 4x before the flop with the hands in our chart (3-3 or better, any ace, any suited king, K-5 offsuit and better, Q-6 suited, Q-8 offsuit, J-8 suited, J-10 offsuit and better). After the flop, bet 2x with a pair that uses one of your hole cards (in our examples even bottom pair qualified, pocket twos did not). On the river, bet more hands than feels right: Q-9 on a K-7-4-3-2 board is still a bet.

What is the house edge in ultimate texas holdem?

In our exact calculation with perfect play it is 2.19% of the ante (2.185%), using the Queensland and ACT blind paytable: royal flush 500 to 1, straight flush 50, four of a kind 10, full house 3, flush 3 to 2 and straight 1 to 1.

Should you ever raise 3x in ultimate texas holdem?

No. Queensland and the ACT allow 3x or 4x before the flop, but in our calculation every hand worth a preflop raise is worth more at 4x than at 3x, and every other hand is better off checking.

Can you play ultimate texas holdem online in Australia?

Not from a legal site. It is an online casino game under the Interactive Gambling Act 2001, so it cannot be offered to people in Australia over the internet. You can play it at casinos whose regulators have approved its rules, such as in Queensland and the ACT.