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AQo vs 22

AQo
VS
22
47.8%
equity for AQo — 22 takes 52.3%

Pair against two overcards — the classic coinflip, with the pair a shade ahead.

AQo Win
47.4%
Tie
0.6%
AQo Lose
51.9%
Card combinations
72
AQo vs random
64.4% · #14
22 vs random
50.2% · #88
Breakdown

Win, tie and loss for AQo

Win 47.4%Lose 51.9%

When AQo and 22 get all in before the flop, AQo wins 47.8% of the time and 22 takes 52.3%. Broken down, AQo wins outright 47.4%, chops 0.6% and loses 51.9% — a margin of -4.5 points. Pair against two overcards — the classic coinflip, with the pair a shade ahead.

The same matchup shifts depending on how the suits overlap. With no shared suit the number is 47.4% (for example As Qh against 2d 2c); with both suits shared it is 48.0% (As Qh against 2s 2h). That is a spread of 0.57 points across the 72 distinct card combinations, and it comes almost entirely from whether the two hands are fighting over the same flush.

Add a third player holding a random hand and the split becomes AQo 39.6%, 22 31.7%, random 28.6%. AQo gives up 8.1 points and 22 gives up 20.5, so the underdog loses more than the favourite does. Extra players always eat into the leader's share faster than into anyone else's.

Taken on their own, AQo is worth 64.4% against a random hand (rank 14 of 169) and 22 is worth 50.2% (rank 88). The gap between them in the ranking is only 14.2 points, yet head to head the gap is 4.5 points, which is roughly what the ranking table predicts.

Framed as a run of one hundred identical all-ins, AQo scoops roughly 47 pots, splits about one, and loses the remaining 52. Against eight random opponents rather than this one specific hand, AQo would be down to 17.5% and 22 to 12.5%, so the shape of this particular confrontation matters far more than either hand's standing in the overall ranking.

From 22's side, 52.3% is the break-even point for calling an all-in at 0.91:1 pot odds. Put another way, the call is profitable as long as the amount you have to put in is less than 52.3% of the pot you are playing for. AQo holds the other 47.8% of that same pot.

Two caveats keep this figure honest. First, it is showdown equity across all 72 card combinations with five board cards still to come — there is no fold equity in it, so the value of shoving in practice is usually higher than the raw percentage suggests. Second, it assumes 22 really does hold exactly 22; against the wider range a player would actually get all in with, AQo's 47.8% moves. Use the individual pages for AQo and 22 to see how each of them fares against all 168 other holdings before treating this single pairing as the whole picture.

By shared suits

Overlapping suits move the number

200,000 simulated showdowns per condition. The example column shows one concrete four-card layout.

ConditionExampleCombosAQo EquityWinTieLose
No shared suitAs Qh vs 2d 2c1247.4%47.1%0.6%52.3%
One shared suitAs Qh vs 2s 2d4847.8%47.5%0.6%51.9%
Both suits sharedAs Qh vs 2s 2h1248.0%47.7%0.7%51.7%
Three-way

Adding a random third hand

200,000 simulated showdowns, with the third hand dealt at random each time.

AQo
39.6%
vs heads-up -8.1pt
22
31.7%
vs heads-up -20.5pt
Random third hand
28.6%
Player count

At a bigger table

Random opponentsAQo22
164.4%50.2%
246.9%30.2%
430.3%17.8%
817.5%12.5%

Related

FAQ

AQo or 22 — which is ahead preflop?

22 is the favourite. AQo takes 47.8% and 22 52.3%, a margin of 4.5 points, with 0.6% of hands ending in a chop.

Do the suits change AQo vs 22?

Yes. With no shared suit it is 47.4%, and with both suits shared it is 48.0% — a swing of up to 0.57 points.

What happens three-way?

With one extra random hand in the pot the split is AQo 39.6%, 22 31.7%, random 28.6%. AQo drops 8.1 points compared with heads-up.

424 words / 29 distinct figures — Method