Pot Odds and Pot Equity

How to Figure The Pot Odds

Whether you like it or not, poker is a game of odds. There are odds not only on whether you’ll win the hand or not, but on filling your flush or hitting a set by the river. There are odds on every part of the game. The better you are at calculating these odds the more success you’ll have at the game.
One of the most important calculations is the pot odds. It’s not necessary for you to be a mathematician in order to calculate the pot odds in a hand of poker. Pot odds are the odds offered by the pot to make the call. In other words, the amount of money in the pot compared to the amount of money it will cost to stay in the hand. The math in this is simple.
For example: You go into the flop heads up. The pot contains $100, your opponent bets $50.
The opponent’s bet becomes part of the pot and now the contains $150. In order to call, it will cost you $50. That means the pot is 3 time the bet needed to call or 3 :1 pot odds.

How to Calculate Equity

After you calculate pot odds, the next step is to determine your equity. Your odds of winning the hand against the odds of your opponent winning the hand. The easiest way to calculate the equity is to take your number of outs and multiply it by four on the flop or by two on the turn.
This will translate your chance into a percentage. For example: if you have a flush draw, you have nine outs on the flop. 9×4=36% chance of end up with the best hand. This means you’ll win 36 times out of a 100 hands with these cards. The flip side of this is you will lose 64 times out of a 100 hands played. This percentage converted to a ratio will give you your equity. In other words 64 is almost twice as much as 36, so your ratio would be 2:1. For every hand you win you will lose two in the same circumstance. When making these calculations, it’s not necessary to be exact, close will work.

Pot Odds Compared To Equity

Should you make the call or not? To find out simply look to the numbers on the left.

In our examples pot odds were 3:1 and equity was 2:1. With the 3 being higher than the 2 in the examples, it would be a good call. Every time the pot odds are higher than the equity it is a good call statistically.
Never forget their is no substitute for intuition. Use these calculations along with your intuition and it will absolutely improve your game.