Video Poker Odds Explained

How Wild Cards Transform Your Odds

Wild cards completely change the mathematics of video poker by giving you extra ways to make winning hands. This means cards designated as wild can become any card you need to complete your best possible combination. 

The more wild cards in a game, the more your odds shift toward hitting stronger hands. At the same time, payouts on smaller hands are lower than in games without wild cards. Some completely disappear from the paytable because they are too common when wilds are added to the deck. 

Games with wild cards require different strategies because you are working with more possibilities. You will see much higher frequencies of premium hands like straights, flushes, and even four of a kind compared to standard Jacks or Better. Each wild card game has a different strategy, including when payables change within the same variant. 

Deuces Wild Odds Breakdown

Deuces Wild makes all four 2s in the deck wild cards. This dramatically increases your chances of making strong hands since you have four extra cards that can become anything you need. The minimum qualifying hand jumps up to three of a kind because pairs become much easier to make.

Your odds of hitting a natural royal flush actually decrease in Deuces Wild due to how often wilds enter the picture, but you gain the possibility of making other big hands. The wild cards create entirely new hand rankings that do not exist in regular poker, giving you more ways to win but requiring you to learn new optimal plays. This includes five of a kind, a wild royal flush, and four deuces.

Bonus Deuces Wild

Bonus Deuces Wild, sometimes called Deuces Wild Bonus, is a higher-variance version of the original game. It lowers the straight payout to one coin, while increasing five of a kind hands and adding a special payout when the player makes four deuces with an ace kicker. Five of a kind pays 20 per coin in this game for 6s to kings, 40 for five 3s, 4s, and 5s, and 80 for five aces. Four deuces with an ace kicker pays 400 coins for each one bet. That is double the normal four deuces payout.

Double Bonus Deuces Wild

Double Bonus Deuces Wild increases the payouts on special five of a kind hands beyond Bonus Deuces Wild. In this version, five 3s, 4s, and 5s pay 50 per coin, while five aces doubles to 160.

Double Deuces

Double Deuces is an older variant. It lowers the flush and full house payouts and doubles the win on four deuces.

Joker Poker Probability Changes

Joker Poker adds just one wild card to a standard 52-card deck, creating a 53-card game. This single joker gives you extra winning opportunities without completely transforming the game like Deuces Wild does. In the most common version, you will need a pair of kings or better to qualify for a payout instead of jacks. Some versions require two pair to win, which increases the payout on five of a kind and a wild royal flush. 

The lone joker creates interesting strategic decisions because you do not see it as often as the four deuces in Deuces Wild. When you do get the joker, it becomes incredibly valuable for completing difficult hands like straights and flushes that might otherwise be impossible with your other four cards.

Joker Poker is one of the most difficult video poker strategies to learn, especially when dealt the wild card. The joker is rarely held alone on a draw. In most cases where there is no winner or good draw, keep a 7, then a 6 or 8, 5 or 9, or a 10, in that order. This is done with the goal of making more straights and flushes over holding the joker by itself.

Deuces and Joker Poker

Deuces and Joker Poker combines both types of wild card games. All four deuces and the joker are wild. This lowers most payouts in the game as strong hands are even more likely than in Deuces Wild alone. The jackpot hand in Deuces and Joker Poker is all five wilds, which pays 2.5x more than a natural royal flush.

Double Bonus And Bonus Poker Variants

Bonus poker games focus on giving you bigger payouts for four-of-a-kind hands. This means the standard pay table gets adjusted to offer much higher rewards when you hit quads, especially with specific card ranks.  These games appeal to players who want the chance at larger wins during their sessions and are willing to have higher variance to achieve it.

The trade-off for these enhanced quad payouts usually comes from reduced returns on more common hands. You will typically see lower payouts for two pair, full houses, or flushes compared to standard Jacks or Better, creating a more volatile playing experience.

Bonus Poker has the lowest variance in this family of games. That is because two pair still pays two coins for each one bet to give a small increase in the payouts for quad aces, 2s, 3s, and 4s.. All other Bonus games only pay one coin on two pair. 

Double Bonus Poker doubles the win for four aces, 2s, 3s, and 4s, while Double Double Bonus adds even more complexity with different payouts based on the kicker card. Triple Double Bonus takes this concept further with massive payouts for specific four-of-a-kind combinations, but you must adjust your strategy to see these premium hands more often. Four aces with a 2, 3, or 4 kicker in Triple Double Bonus has the same payout as a royal flush. However, three of a kind only pays two coins, as opposed to the normal three. 

Bonus Poker Deluxe is another version of this group. All four of a kind hands pay 80 coins. It does not matter what card makes quads. Kickers do not matter in Bonus Poker Deluxe. 

• Higher volatility: Bigger wins are offset by lower payouts on smaller hands
• Strategy changes: You may need to hold different cards to draw to special four-of-a-kind hands
• Bankroll considerations: These games require larger bankrolls than Jacks or Better and more patience during losing streaks

What Are The Odds Of Hitting Each Hand?

Understanding the probability of each winning hand helps you make better decisions about which cards to hold and discard. These odds vary significantly between different video poker variants, so you need to know what you are working with before you start playing. The math behind these probabilities comes from the total number of possible five-card combinations in each game.

Standard video poker uses a 52-card deck, giving you specific mathematical odds for each hand type. When wild cards enter the picture, these probabilities shift dramatically because you have more ways to complete winning combinations.

Royal Flush Probability By Game Type

A royal flush is the strongest possible hand in video poker, consisting of 10-J-Q-K-A all in the same suit. In Jacks or Better, you have exactly four ways to make this hand out of over 2.5 million possible combinations. This makes the royal flush extremely rare, but also the most rewarding hand you can achieve.

Deuces Wild changes royal flush odds because you can use wild 2s to complete the hand. However, the game distinguishes between “natural” royal flushes, which have no wild cards, and wild royal flushes, also known as dirty royals. Natural royal flushes pay exponentially more than dirty ones in Deuces Wild games. 

Joker Poker follows similar logic, giving you slightly better odds of hitting a royal flush thanks to the extra wild card. In some two pair or better versions of Joker Poker, natural and wild royal flushes have the same payout, while other versions have separate payouts for these hands. 

The odds of getting dealt a natural royal flush in any 52-card game are 649,740-to-1. In Joker Poker, it is 775,599-to-1. 

Making any royal flush, including the draw in Jacks or Better and Joker Poker games is about 40,000-to-1. In Deuces Wild, it is about 45,000-to-1, depending on the version. 

The royal flush jackpot drives much of video poker’s appeal because it offers massive payouts that can be as much as 2% of the game’s total return. At Hard Rock Bet, you will find games with progressive royal flush jackpots that grow with every hand dealt until someone hits the big one.

Common Hand Odds Comparison

Straight flushes, four of a kind, and full houses make up the middle tier of video poker hands. These combinations hit much more frequently than royal flushes but still offer substantial payouts. Your odds of making these hands depend heavily on which variant you are playing and how many wild cards are involved.

Four of a kind becomes much more common in wild card games, which is why bonus poker variants focus their enhanced payouts on these hands. Full houses and flushes hit regularly enough that they form the backbone of your winning sessions, especially in Jacks or Better, where they offer solid 9-to-1 and 6-to-1 payouts, respectively.

• Straight flush: Rare but achievable, especially with wild cards helping complete the sequence
• Four of a kind: The target hand in bonus poker games, where the payout is higher than rarer straight flushes, with varying odds based on wild cards
• Full house: A reliable mid-tier winner that appears multiple times per session
• Flush: Common enough to keep your bankroll steady while you wait for bigger hands
• Straight: Slightly easier to make than flushes, providing consistent, smaller wins

FAQ about Video Poker Odds

Below we’ve put together a few questions and answers about video poker odds.