Poker is a card game in which players place chips, representing money, into a communal pot. The player with the highest hand wins the pot. The game can be played with 2 to 14 people, although the ideal number is 6. Players start by contributing one or more mandatory bets, called blinds, to the pot before being dealt cards. After the initial deal, there is a round of betting during which each player has the opportunity to either call or fold. Then a final showdown is conducted, during which the cards are revealed and the winning hand takes the pot.

A major part of the skill involved in Poker is learning to minimize losses with weak hands and maximize gains with strong ones. This is accomplished by making bluff bets when the player believes the bet has positive expected value or by trying to deceive other players for various strategic reasons.

The game has a great deal of psychological elements as well. The game can be very stressful, especially when played for large amounts of money. Professional poker players are adept at extracting signal from noise and using multiple channels of information to exploit their opponents and protect themselves.

The rules of Poker vary slightly by game and even among games in the same family, but they are generally consistent and can be learned fairly quickly. The basic rules are as follows: