A9o

A9o (ace-nine offsuit) wins 60.8% of the time against a single random opponent, which places it 25th out of the 169 starting hands — the top 14.8% of the range. At a six-handed table (five opponents) its equity falls to 20.4% and its rank moves to 47; nine-handed (eight opponents) it holds 12.6% for rank 64. An ace-high hand — watch out for kicker trouble and domination.

Its suited/offsuit twin A9s runs at 62.8% (rank 18), a gap of 2 points. Losing the shared suit costs 2 points of raw equity. The hand directly above it in the ranking is A7s at 60.9%, and directly below is KJo at 60.5%, so three hands are packed into a band of 0.4 points.

Played heads-up against each of the other 168 hands, A9o is a favourite against 146 of them and an underdog against 22. Its best matchup is 92o at 76.9% and its worst is AA at 6.1% — a spread of 70.8 points, which is why calling A9o simply "strong" or "weak" says very little.

A9o dominates 8 hands that share one of its ranks, pushing hardest against 92o at 76.9%. It is dominated by 8 hands in return, the worst of them AKs, which leaves A9o with only 24.6%. 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 6 of 78. The strongest hand in that group, AKo, is 4.6 points away, and the weakest, 32o, sits 28.5 points below. Measured against the average equity of all 169 hands, 51%, A9o lands +9.8 points from the middle of the pack, and 24 hands in the full ranking are still ahead of it.

Adding players costs equity steadily: 60.8% against one opponent, 41.6% against two, 24.4% against four and 12.6% against eight. That last figure is 114% 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 A9o reads as 60.8% 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.

A9o 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) 23.7%. By the river it has made a pair or better 48.7% of the time.

For straights, the flop completes one 0.0000% of the time (zero flops — the two cards are too far apart), gives an eight-out draw 1.31% and a four-out gutshot 5.22%. By the river a straight using a hole card completes 2.53% of the time.

Put together, A9o flops a pair or better or a strong draw (an eight-out straight draw) 33.7% of the time — rank 143 of the 156 unpaired hands (tied with 6 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, A9o goes from 60.8% before the flop up to 79.7% when either card pairs, and down to 51.7% 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 61.5%, two-tone 60.4%, monotone 59.1%. A monotone flop in one of your suits gives 68.8%. A paired board gives 63.6%, and a connected board (three ranks within five) 59.4%. The best row in the table is "Either card hits (a matching rank on the flop)" at 79.7%, the worst "Neither card hits" at 51.7%.

The 60.8% 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 60.77% (a gap of 0.03 points). Each equity is taken with the flop out and the turn and river still to come.