Five-Card Draw

It’s Hold’em, except nobody shares cards and you get to trade some in

The hand rankings are the ones you already know: flush beats straight, straight beats trips, and so on. But there’s no board. Everyone gets five cards face down, there’s a round of betting, then each player gets one chance to throw away some cards and draw new ones, then another round of betting, then showdown. Best five-card hand wins.

It’s often the first poker game anyone learns, and it’s now rare in casinos. These days you’ll mostly find it in mixed cash games and WSOP Dealer’s Choice events.

30-second cheat sheet

• Five cards each, face down. One betting round, one draw, a second betting round, showdown.
• Casino and online norm: button, small blind and big blind. Home games and older rules use an ante and no blinds.
• Usually no-limit or pot-limit with one draw. Limit exists (the bet doubles after the draw).
• Draw: each live player, starting left of the button, discards some cards and gets new ones. Normally up to three. Keeping all five is called standing pat.
• Normal high-poker rankings, with no qualifier. Best five-card hand wins the whole pot. Ties split.
• Some games add an opening requirement (jacks or better) or a joker (the bug). Ask what’s posted.
• 2 to 6 players is ideal, since the deck has to cover everyone’s draws.

Full rules

The deal and first betting round

Everyone gets five cards face down. In a casino or online, there’s a button with a small blind and a big blind. WSOP Dealer’s Choice and tournaments use blinds plus antes in no-limit play. Older rules and home games use an ante and a button with no blinds.

The first betting round starts left of the big blind. Some games let you open on anything (called “guts to open”). Others require a pair of jacks or better to open. See below.

The draw

Starting left of the button, each live player says how many cards to discard (usually up to three), discards them face down, and gets that many replacements. Keeping all five is standing pat. Then there’s a second betting round:

• Blind games: action starts with the first live player left of the button.
• Ante games (Robert’s Rules): action starts with the opener, or the next player clockwise if the opener folded.

If a lot of cards get drawn, the deck can run out. The standard fix is to shuffle the muck and discards of players who’ve already drawn. Rooms keep the table to six or fewer players.

Betting structure

In rooms it’s mostly no-limit or pot-limit: WSOP Dealer’s Choice lists “No-Limit 5-Card Draw High”, and PokerListings says the first Dealer’s Choice event in 2014 included “Pot-Limit Five Card Draw”. Card Player Lifestyle: “best and most commonly played as either a pot limit or no limit game with one draw.” Fixed limit exists, with the bet doubling after the draw.

Showdown

Standard high-poker ranking: straight flush, four of a kind, full house, flush, straight, three of a kind, two pair, pair, high card. The best five-card hand wins the entire pot. There’s no qualifier. Cards speak. Ties split.

Jacks or better (Jackpots)

Some games require you to hold a pair of jacks or better to open the first betting round. Pagat calls this “probably the most popular version” of five-card draw. Wikipedia says the Gardena “jackpots” version was the main form in California from the 1930s to the 1970s.

• The opener doesn’t need actual jacks, just a hand that beats a pair of tens, like 5-5-3-3-6.
• If you open and then discard some of the cards that made your openers (“splitting openers”), you keep them separate and show them at the end to prove you qualified. If you can’t prove it, the hand is dead.
• If nobody can open, everyone antes again and the cards are redealt. Progressive versions raise the requirement to queens, kings, aces.

The word “jackpot” is said to come from the big pots that this rule created when everyone passed.

The no-restriction game is called guts to open, or California draw. Wikipedia says “guts to open” became the retronym for plain draw.

The joker (bug)

Some games add one joker. In Robert’s Rules and Pagat it’s the bug, which works only as an ace, or to complete a straight, flush or straight flush. In a flush it counts as the highest card of that suit not already in your hand. Four aces plus the joker, five aces, is the best hand. Pagat’s example: 9-9-7-7-joker is two pair with an ace kicker, and A-K-J-4-2 of hearts beats A-10-9-8-joker of spades, because the bug acts as the king.

Rooms disagree

The WSOP live-action rules have no separate draw high section that I could find. This page follows Robert’s Rules of Poker (Section 12) and the WSOP Dealer’s Choice menu.

• How many cards you can draw: Pagat says normally up to three (some allow four if the fifth card is an ace, some allow four or five). PokerNews says most variations allow up to three. Robert’s Rules says up to four consecutive cards, with a five-card draw dealt as four now and the fifth after everyone else has drawn. The WSOP live-action lowball text says up to five consecutive cards.
• Exposed cards before the draw: Robert’s Rules for draw high says any card exposed by the dealer before the draw must be kept. The lowball sections of Robert’s and the WSOP replace exposed cards.
• Check-raise: Robert’s Rules permits it before and after the draw in draw high. Some limit lowball rules ban it, but draw high isn’t one of them.
• Bug or joker: Robert’s says players are told whether the joker is in use. BARGE says the game is played with a joker/bug and sometimes without. The WSOP lowball rules say jokers aren’t used unless posted. Pagat says the bug is optional.
• Opening requirement: BARGE says no requirement (guts to open). Pagat calls jacks or better the most popular and the no-restriction game “California Draw or Guts”.
• Single or multiple draws: Pagat says some play two draws (up to three cards, then one or two). Card Player Lifestyle says it can be played as limit triple draw, but is best and most commonly played pot-limit or no-limit with one draw.
• Variants that change who wins: California high-low split (Wikipedia only: five-card draw with a bug where the best high and best A-5 low split the pot, with an 8-or-better low qualifier, and the high takes all if nobody qualifies). I found no room or WSOP source spreading it, so this page doesn’t cover it. High-low with declaration (simultaneous chip declaration) is a home game rarely found in casinos. Other home variants include Jacks Back, deuces wild, wild widow, Diablo and trips to win.

Worked examples

A flush beats a pair of kings

Same ranking as Hold'em, just with no board

Mia

• Pair of Kings

Noel

• Ace-high flush✓ wins

Noel scoops the whole pot.

Mia has a pair of kings. Noel has an ace-high flush. Flush beats pair. There’s no board and no qualifier, just normal poker rankings.

Kickers

Same pair, so the kicker decides

Olive

• Pair of Kings✓ wins

Pat

• Pair of Kings

Olive scoops the whole pot.

Both players have a pair of kings. The pair is the same, so you compare the next highest card. Olive’s queen beats Pat’s jack.

The wheel

The wheel is still a straight in high poker

Rex

• Five-high straight✓ wins

Sue

• Three Queens

Rex scoops the whole pot.

A-2-3-4-5 is the lowest straight in high poker, and a straight still beats three queens. This is the opposite of what the same five cards do in Razz or 2-7.

The chop

Same ranks, different suits, split pot

Tom

• Ace high✓ wins

Una

• Ace high✓ wins

Tom takes half · Una takes half

Same ranks in different suits. Suits never break ties in poker, so Tom and Una split.

How you’ll embarrass yourself

• Playing too many hands. PokerNews says the classic leak is playing far too many hands, especially chasing straight and flush draws. Four-to-a-flush or four-to-a-straight is only about a 4-to-1 underdog with one card to come.
• Always drawing three to a pair. PokerNews says it’s statistically right, but you should mix it up sometimes or opponents will read you.
• Missing the opener requirement. If jacks or better is posted, you can be forced to prove your opening hand.
• Ignoring how many cards your opponents drew. Card Player Lifestyle says the draw count will “be quite apparent to observant players”: one card is two pair or four to a straight or flush, two cards is trips, three cards is a pair, and four or five cards is usually only from the big blind.
• Treating the bug as wild. It isn’t. It’s an ace or a filler for a straight or flush.

Lore and reputation

Wikipedia calls it “often the first poker variant learned”, but now “rare in casino and tournament play”. Card Player Lifestyle: “Nowadays, the game is virtually impossible to find save for mixed cash games, WSOP Dealers Choice or Big Bet Mix events, and a spattering of online offerings.”

WSOP history: there were four limit “Draw High” bracelet events between 1978 and 1982 (Lakewood Louie 1978 and 1979, Pat Callihan 1980, David Sklansky 1982), per PokerNews. It hasn’t been a standalone bracelet event since and survives inside Dealer’s Choice.

In Gardena, California, jacks-to-open draw was the main game from the 1930s to the 1970s, always secondary to lowball (Wikipedia). Pagat reproduces quotes from R.F. Foster (1897) and J. Scarne (1949) with opposite opinions about jackpots.