Use caution with Ace King?

Common wisdom is that you want to get it all in pre-flop with this hand if you can. But lately I am not so sure. In late position if there is a substantial raise, I am starting to just call the raise and see what comes on the flop. With position, I can judge from the flop how to react. If I hit, I am raising or betting. If I miss and the villain bets into me, I can decide what to do. What do you think about this strategy

I'm never gonna go all in with AK, expect when I'm 10bb. When someone goes all in, I will fold this hand from now on because I lost too many times because people call with a pair(even small ones) and they win because I don't hit any pair most of the time with his hand. Your thinking is good.

It's styles of play, some people are very confident pre-flop, other small ball it. I personally find more success after seeing the flop. Pretty same as you.


I think the reason of being very aggressive pre-flop is to make sure weaker hands don't call you, taking away some probability of getting a bad beat.

It depends on the situation. Stack sizes, positions, player type, ICM-pressure. But typically AK is a hand, I either raise or fold preflop, and folding is only, when I am somewhat deep and face significant action like a cold 4-bet. You can throw in a call from time to time, but it should be the exception not the rule. If for instance you are deep, and a tight player open UTG at a full 9-player table, maybe 3-betting is not really for value, and its ok to just call with AK in position and look to outplay him after the flop.

Going all in or raising as much as you can is a kind of caution, not letting anyone draw out on you without paying the heaviest possible price.

fundiver199 said:

It depends on the situation. Stack sizes, positions, player type, ICM-pressure. But typically AK is a hand, I either raise or fold preflop, and folding is only, when I am somewhat deep and face significant action like a cold 4-bet. You can throw in a call from time to time, but it should be the exception not the rule. If for instance you are deep, and a tight player open UTG at a full 9-player table, maybe 3-betting is not really for value, and its ok to just call with AK in position and look to outplay him after the flop.

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Can't possibly say it any better than this.

There are so many ways to play AK, so there really isn't usually a right or wrong answer. As described, that sounds like a decent strategy. You may not make a ton with it, but you shouldn't lose a ton either.

if taking a safe, more cautious approach with ak works for you, then go for it. there is nothing wrong with playing how you see fit. however, playing ak too passively could potentially be costing you a lot of value. you might be able to keep your losses minimal by playing safely but you also lose a lot of money you could have earned when you do win.

ak is a top 5 hand and even a top 3 hand, depending on who you ask, so it has a ton of value and can make you ton of money when played against a lot of ranges. like any hand, there is always the risk of it losing but being within the top 3-5 hands means it's winning a lot more than it's losing over a long run. personally, with ak, i need a reason to not play it more than i do to play it. it's just that good of a hand.

this strategy is very close to me) I play this hand about the same. And I hate AK

I agree with that playing like that but you will have to switch it up. Money bubbles and final tables. Let's say you're 15 big on the bubble... flop comes ace jack jack what are you gonna do check bet.... now what if you get raised you're calling more than likely so why not put it in pre. Final table 38 bigs I'd see flop go from there. Even early in tournaments going all in is sticky get into alot of flips

Frank7Chipman said:

Common wisdom is that you want to get it all in pre-flop with this hand if you can. But lately I am not so sure. In late position if there is a substantial raise, I am starting to just call the raise and see what comes on the flop. With position, I can judge from the flop how to react. If I hit, I am raising or betting. If I miss and the villain bets into me, I can decide what to do. What do you think about this strategy

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Whenever I'm with AK and someone raises before me, I place 4x the opponent's bet, making my hand very strong and sometimes I always hit an A or a K on the flop and I bet 70% of the pot explaining the opponent so that I don't have a zebra and I will lose my hand!

Frank7Chipman said:

Common wisdom is that you want to get it all in pre-flop with this hand if you can.

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Only when short stacked. Only hand I'm willing to go all-in preflop with deep stack is AA and maybe KK. Definitely not AK. This hand should be played agressive with continuation bet on the flop most of the time but if someone wants to put huge stack preflop I would fold and only call a medium sized re-rise.

It´s worth to gamble with AKo if you´ve a short stack.
AK is not optional to make a all-in with a big stack, because it´s weaker than 22 on preflop. However, AK has a percentage of win that is 45% against 22. Therefore, it´s optional if you´d like to make a double-up from the short stack.

Assuming we are on 100bb or fewer stacks, and no ICM considerations, than we should still mainly look to get it in, unless we are certain that an opponent is extremely tight and can only AA and KK. Against a more reasonable range, we are always getting good enough odds to get it in. There are several other problems with the line that you propose. First, if we do not raise, than we have no fold equity, so we can never win the pot pre-flop. Second, by not raising we keeping the SPR lower post-flop, which makes it harder for us to get the money in and stack our opponent when we do hit. Lastly, we will not realize our equity as often as we should. With a hand like AK you really want to see all 5 cards since you are always drawing to top pair. I think you are going to lose a lot of value with this approach.

at 10bb I always play on the stack.

AK should be played according to where you are in the tournament, what your position is, and how many other players have entered. Also take into account stack sizes and how tight the table is.

Yesterday I lost two AK preflop all ins on the same final table, both to lower Ax hands. AK is not bullet proof, but nothing is preflop.

I don't like getting all my chips in preflop unless I have AA or it is late in the tourney. Once blinds and antes are a huge percentage of your stack, I will shove to win them. Even if I'm called I have a good chance to double up. I almost never call an all in with AK, because you lose fold equity when you call an all in. Then it is a coin flip (unless villain shoves with AQ or such).

Early and mid tourney, play them as you do any good cards. Raise or 3-bet depending on action. A small C-bet is typical, but beware of draw heavy boards and heavy action. Don't get married to them even if you have tptk. It still loses to two pair and sets.

While A-K is an excellent starting hand, I try not to get too carried away with it. I'm obviously going to put a raise in with it. But I'm not going to automatically try to get all my chips in pre-flop with it. While I've seen a lot of chips won playing this hand aggressively, I have undoubtedly seen more chips lost with this hand than any other because a lot of players have a tendency to get carried away with it. Like I said, I'm going to put a raise in with it, but beyond that what I do with it is going to depend on circumstances. If I'm short stacked I might be happy to go all-in with it. If I have a big stack, I might be willing to call the next man's all-in with it. As a general rule though, I try to avoid risking all of my chips on any one hand, even if it is an excellent starting hand.

I noticed that lately any all-in has turned into a coin toss, no matter how strong your hand is. Therefore, you should not risk the entire stack already on the preflop, of course, if you do not have a very short stack.

I try to play as professionals play on streams and in live tournaments with this hand. Raise or call allin from other players. If I don’t get preflop and in a position I raise. If my opponent pre-flop raises then I have to re-raise to stay with headsup. In this situation, there is little chance either against kk or aa. In other cases, it is like throwing a coin.

AK pre flop I prefer to bet hard so I keep as few players as possible, thus increasing the chances of winning !!

2x pot preflop ) , and i hit the K or A than on flop pot bet again ) , if i dont hit it i CB 60%

In a full-table no-limit hold'em cash game, you should raise with AK almost always when you act as an open raiser, or after one / several limpers. This applies to early, middle, and late positions. At the moment, you most likely have the strongest hand, and thanks to a raise, you can achieve one of two things (which are both beneficial to you): You will win the hand right away. You will increase the bank, which you later try to take. In loose games, you can raise a larger size.

fundiver199 said:

It depends on the situation. Stack sizes, positions, player type, ICM-pressure. But typically AK is a hand, I either raise or fold preflop, and folding is only, when I am somewhat deep and face significant action like a cold 4-bet. You can throw in a call from time to time, but it should be the exception not the rule. If for instance you are deep, and a tight player open UTG at a full 9-player table, maybe 3-betting is not really for value, and its ok to just call with AK in position and look to outplay him after the flop.

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Couldn't have said it better myself. How you choose to play Ace, King is up to your playstyle and game preference, but it is usually a good hand we want value from. Just like with many other hands (JJ or Ace-rag come to mind), many players get into trouble with them because they over-value the strength of these hands. AK is one of those hands that can get you to lose a ton of chips when you misplay it. I am usually playing AK for value, but let us not go crazy with it either: I wouldn't mind folding AK to strong aggression or the situation, but I think this starting hand is usually too good to fold without you missing out on value.

AK is a premium hand but if you face a raise or reraise I would be cautious. What can they have? Against AA you are terrible. Against KK pretty bad. You are also losing against any other pair. You are ahaead vs AQ, AJ, KQ etc. but would anyone raise or re-raise these? This is a hand I want to see flop with, prefferably with position and try to outplay from there.

AK is a really good hand, but I think that its depend of the tournament and the situation. You have a lot of odds to win but you must play with caution and analyze the hand