A5o

A5o (ace-five offsuit) wins 57.7% of the time against a single random opponent, which places it 42th out of the 169 starting hands — the top 24.9% of the range. At a six-handed table (five opponents) its equity falls to 18.1% and its rank moves to 68; nine-handed (eight opponents) it holds 11.4% for rank 87. An ace-high hand — watch out for kicker trouble and domination.

Its suited/offsuit twin A5s runs at 59.8% (rank 32), a gap of 2.1 points. Losing the shared suit costs 2.1 points of raw equity. The hand directly above it in the ranking is Q9s at 57.7%, and directly below is A2s at 57.6%, so three hands are packed into a band of 0.1 points.

Played heads-up against each of the other 168 hands, A5o is a favourite against 138 of them and an underdog against 30. Its best matchup is K5o at 75.5% and its worst is AA at 8.1% — a spread of 67.4 points, which is why calling A5o simply "strong" or "weak" says very little.

A5o dominates 8 hands that share one of its ranks, pushing hardest against K5o at 75.5%. It is dominated by 8 hands in return, the worst of them AKs, which leaves A5o with only 26.1%. A single kicker can move the number by tens of points, and the full table below lists every one of those opponents.

Within the 78 offsuit hands it comes 13 of 78. The strongest hand in that group, AKo, is 7.7 points away, and the weakest, 32o, sits 25.4 points below. Measured against the average equity of all 169 hands, 51%, A5o lands +6.7 points from the middle of the pack, and 41 hands in the full ranking are still ahead of it.

Adding players costs equity steadily: 57.7% against one opponent, 38.0% against two, 22.0% against four and 11.4% against eight. That last figure is 103% of an even nine-way share (11.1%). The Chen formula scores this hand at 5 points, and it arrives 0.9% of the time (12 of 1,326 combinations).

One caveat worth repeating: every number on this page assumes the opponent holds a completely random hand and that the pot goes to showdown. Real opponents hold ranges, and a range that has already put money in is stronger than random — which is exactly why A5o reads as 57.7% here but plays worse than that against a raise. Use the 168 rows in the table below to see which specific holdings are the problem, rather than treating the headline figure as a verdict on the hand.

A5o pairs the board on the flop — at least one of its two ranks hits — 32.4% of the time, and flops top pair or better (the paired card is the highest on the board, or two pair and up) 19.0%. By the river it has made a pair or better 48.7% of the time.

For straights, the flop completes one 0.327% of the time (64 flops), gives an eight-out draw 1.31% and a four-out gutshot 12.7%. By the river a straight using a hole card completes 4.29% of the time.

Put together, A5o flops a pair or better or a strong draw (an eight-out straight draw) 34.1% of the time — rank 129 of the 156 unpaired hands (tied with 13 others). The highest is JTs, T9s, 98s and 4 others at 50.6% and the lowest AKo, A2o at 32.8%.

Against one random hand, A5o goes from 57.7% before the flop up to 74.9% when either card pairs, and down to 49.4% when both miss. It connects 32.4% of the time (6,356 of 19,600 flops). Nothing ranks above A, so a miss never brings an overcard.

By board shape: rainbow 58.4%, two-tone 57.3%, monotone 55.9%. A monotone flop in one of your suits gives 65.0%. A paired board gives 61.5%, and a connected board (three ranks within five) 55.0%. The best row in the table is "Either card hits (a matching rank on the flop)" at 74.9%, the worst "Neither card hits" at 49.4%.

The 57.7% at the top of the page is a 400,000-hand simulation; this table counts every deal of the opponent's two cards and the five-card board (2,097,572,400 per starting hand), which puts the pre-flop figure at 57.70% (a gap of 0.00 points). Each equity is taken with the flop out and the turn and river still to come.