What is a Flush in Poker?

A Flush is a poker hand made out of five cards, all of which have the same symbol or suit. They are one of the mid-range poker hands as far as strength goes but it can still win a nice pot.

What does a Flush look like?

All five cards in a Flush poker hand have the same color and suit. A few examples would be:

A♦, Q♦, 10♦, 7♦, 4♦
J♠, 9♠, 8♠, 4♠, 3♠
10♥, 7♥, 4♥, 3♥, 2♥
8♣, 7♣, 5♣, 4♣, 3♣

How does a Flush rank?

As far as poker hand values go, a Flush is in the middle of the list. It beats a fair amount of hands but loses to hands like Four of a Kind and a Full House.

What Beats Full House?

Rank	Hand Names	Example	Hand Description
1	Royal Flush	10 J Q K A	10, Jack, Queen, King, Ace all in the same suit.
2	Straight Flush	4 5 6 7 8	Five cards in a row, all in the same suit.
3	Four of a Kind	10 7 7 7 7	The same card in each of the four suits.
4	Full House	K K K J J	A pair plus three of a kind in the same hand.
5	Flush	6 8 Q 3 10	Five cards, all in one suit, but not in numerical order.
6	Straight	10 9 8 7 6	Five cards in numerical order, but not of the same suit.
7	Three of a Kind	2 J K K K	Three of one card and two non-paired cards.
8	Two Pair	Q 4 4 A A	Two different pairings or sets of the same card in one hand.
9	One Pair	7 8 Q 5 5	One pairing of the same card.
10	High Card	2 3 7 Q K	No matching cards.

The rank of a Flush is determined by the highest card in the hand. An Ace-high Flush is the strongest. As an example, K♥-8♥-5♥-3♥-2♥ is better than Q♥-J♥-5♥-3♥-2♥ (Hearts). If two or more players have the same high card, the tie is broken by the second card rank, and so on.

How should you play a Flush in Hold’em?

A big advantage of having a Flush is that you can form one using either one or two of your hole cards.

Flopping a Flush is rare, so you’ll need to be prepared to chase one on the turn or river. The way you go about chasing a Flush depends on the situation and cards you�ve been dealt.

If you’re chasing it then you might want to raise pre-flop to get rid of any potential cheap banana skins that could later form a stronger hand.

You may well have called with suited lower value connectors. Or you might have found the flop landing kindly with same-suited cards being dealt.

You simply have to play the hand as its dealt but try to find the right balance between slow play and showing some strength to your hand.

That is certainly the case if you�re fortunate to flop a Flush. You don’t want to give your hand away, but you want to make sure you get paid for your decent hand.

Flush Probabilities

In Texas Hold'em, where players have a total of seven cards available for making the strongest hands of five cards, a Flush can occur pretty frequently. There are more than 5,000 ways to get a Flush from deck of 52 cards.

In this instance, we’ll look at the odds of being dealt a Flush on the flop. Meaning a player will have five cards � consisting of their two hole cards and the three flop cards.

Number of ways to draw the hand (not including different suits)	Number of ways to draw the hand (including different suits)	Odds of getting a Flush	Probability of getting a Flush
1,277	5,108	1 / 508.8	0.1965%

The odds of being dealt a Flush on the flop is only the tip of the iceberg. For more on odds, including the probability of winning any given hand on the flop, turn, and/or river, have a play with our poker odds calculator.

FAQS

A Flush poker hand is the term used when all five cards in the same hand have an identical suit. If a player is holding 6♥-8♥-K♥-2♥-J♥ of Hearts, that is called a King-high Flush. You can learn more about poker nicknames here.

A Flush is beaten by the best poker hands in the game: Full House, Four of a Kind, Straight Flush, and Royal Flush. It is also possible for a Flush to lose to another Flush hand. The rank is based on the highest card (or cards) in the combination. Learn all of the poker hands here.

Yes. Any Flush beats any regular Straight.

There are plenty of poker card hands that rank under a Flush. The one just lower on the list is a Straight, followed by Three of a Kind, and Two Pairs.

Having a formed Flush will give you a very good chance at winning the hand. In Texas Hold'em, the community cards can also help opponents get a Flush. The rank can be very important.

Ace high is the strongest Flush hand followed by King high and then Queen high etc. If two or more players both possess a Flush with the same high card then the second highest card will determine the winner.