Every hand, counted
There are only 22,100 possible three-card hands, so this table is a complete enumeration rather than a sample.
| Hand | Combinations | Probability |
|---|---|---|
| Straight flush | 48 | 0.2172% |
| Three of a kind | 52 | 0.2353% |
| Straight | 720 | 3.2579% |
| Flush | 1,096 | 4.9593% |
| Pair | 3,744 | 16.9412% |
| High card | 16,440 | 74.3891% |
Why a straight beats a flush
In five-card poker a flush beats a straight. Here the order reverses, and it is not a house convention: it falls out of the counts.
There are 720 straights and 1,096 flushes. The straight is rarer, so it ranks higher. Poker hand rankings have always been ordered by scarcity, and with three cards instead of five the scarcity order changes.
The reason is that a flush needs only three cards of one suit, which is comparatively easy, while a straight still needs three specific consecutive ranks.
The full order
Straight flush, three of a kind, straight, flush, pair, high card. Note that three of a kind outranks a straight here too, and for the same reason: there are only 52 of them.
What it means at the table
You are dealt nothing but a high card 74.4% of the time, so three quarters of hands come down to whether your high card plays. Our Ante and Play page covers where that line sits.
Frequently Asked Questions
- Does a straight beat a flush in three card poker?
- Yes. There are 720 straights and 1,096 flushes among the 22,100 hands, so the straight is rarer and ranks higher.
- Why is it different from normal poker?
- Rankings follow scarcity. With three cards a flush is easier to make than a straight, which reverses the usual order.
- How often do I get a pair or better?
- 25.6% of the time. The other 74.4% is high card.
- What is the rarest hand?
- A straight flush, at 48 of 22,100 hands.
Hand frequencies and Pair Plus returns on this page are counted by enumerating all 22,100 three-card hands. The Ante/Play house edge is the exception: deriving it requires comparing every player hand against every dealer hand, so that figure is attributed rather than computed here. Pay tables vary by casino; read the felt.