The 8 most expensive video poker mistakes
Most strategy advice says what's wrong. An exact solver can say what wrong costs. Every number below is exact — enumerated, not simulated — and every one links to a page where you can check it.
The two mistakes that happen before the first deal
These dwarf everything below because they tax every hand, not just the misplayed ones. Ten seconds of paytable reading is the highest-paid work in the casino.
The six in-hand mistakes, priced per occurrence
Exact EV loss per coin on 9/6 Jacks or Better, each from a fully enumerated example deal:
The first row is rare but catastrophic — and it’s the one place intuition screams the loudest, because you’re asked to break a made, paying hand. The middle rows are the everyday leaks: the pair-versus-draw family flips direction depending on whether the draw is a flush or a straight, and kickers are pure habit with a permanent price tag. The A-K-Q-J line is the one most simple charts get wrong — ours includes it because adding it is worth an exact +0.025%.
What a “small” leak compounds to
A player who makes one 0.15-per-coin mistake every 20 hands leaks 0.75% of total return — enough to turn the best game in the house into a below-average one. That’s the entire thesis of this site: we measured what simplified play costs (exactly 0.0846% for the classic chart, 0.0362% for ours), and the trainer prices every real mistake you make the same way.
Find your leaks — free trainer, exact feedback →New to the game? Start with how to play. All numbers reproducible in the hand analyzer. 18+, training only.