Poker Hand Rankings: Royal Flush

The royal flush represents the best possible five-card you can make according to standard poker hand rankings. 

A royal flush consists of a ten-to-ace straight, and all five cards must be the same suit. There are only four ways to make a royal flush out of a 52-card poker deck.

Here’s an example of a royal flush:

Other examples of the royal flush include A♣ K♣ Q♣ J♣ T♣, A♥ K♥ Q♥ J♥ T♥ , and A♦ K♦ Q♦ J♦ T♦. Only these four combinations make a royal flush, which combines the best possible straight and best possible flush in the same hand.

How Does the Royal Flush Rank?

The royal flush tops the poker hand rankings chart, as it beats all other hands in a showdown. With only four total ways to make a royal flush, this hand represents the rarest possible made hand in poker.

If you draw five cards randomly from a 52-card deck, the probability of making a royal flush is 0.000154%. The odds against drawing a royal flush are 649,739-to-1.

Calculating the odds of making a hand in Texas Hold’em requires a bit of a different formula, as the object of the game is to make the best possible five-card hand out of seven cards.

The probability of making a royal flush in Texas Hold’em with all five community cards on the board is 0.0032%. This can also be expressed as 30,939-to-1 odds against.

Examples

Check out some famous examples of the strongest hand in poker. The first happened in the PCA 2016 Poker Event:

Here is another classic example of players making this hand: