Poker is a card game with many variations played by millions of people worldwide. In most games, players make a bet (called a “call”) after seeing their cards. They can also raise the bet, adding more money to the pot and forcing other players to choose between calling or folding.
In the modern world, poker has become popular partly because of television coverage of poker tournaments, such as the World Series of Poker and the World Poker Tour. As a result, many people have begun to play poker at home and in other places. There are now hundreds of books on the subject, and professional poker players earn millions of dollars each year from playing poker.
The goal of the game is to win the “pot,” which consists of all the bets placed during one round of the game. The highest-ranking hand wins the pot. Occasionally, multiple hands tie for the top prize and the winnings are divided equally among the players who have those hands.
Before betting begins, each player is dealt 2 cards that are hidden from the other players, called their hole or pocket cards. These are the personal cards that they will use to build their best 5-card hand. Then 3 community cards are revealed on the table, called the flop. The players take turns placing bets, which must be made in accordance with the rules of the specific poker variant being played.
Some players are forced to place a bet, called a blind bet, in addition to their own ante bet. However, most of the money that is bet in a poker game is placed voluntarily by players who believe the bet has positive expected value or are trying to bluff other players for strategic reasons.