Poker is a card game played with chips (representing money) by two or more players. The object of the game is to win the pot, which is the sum of all bets made during a deal. There are many different variations of the game, but all share the same general rules.

Each player starts the game with a fixed amount of chips. These chips have different colors and are worth varying amounts of money: white chips are worth the minimum ante, red chips are worth five whites, and blue chips are worth ten whites.

There are four rounds of betting in a poker hand: before the flop, after the flop, after the turn, and after the river. During each round you can choose to fold, check (no bet), call, or raise. If you raise a player after they have already raised, this is called a “re-raise.”

Before the first betting round begins one of the players at the table, usually the player to the left of the button, must place a bet into the pot. This is known as posting the blinds.

After the blinds are posted, each player in turn reveals their cards. The player with the highest ranked hand wins the pot.

A high poker hand includes any combination of five consecutive cards of the same rank – for example, Ace-King high. A low poker hand is a straight or a flush. A wraparound straight is a run of cards that start high and finish low, such as Q-K-A-2-3.