Equity is a probability rather than a claim on chips. Holding AK against a pair of queens you have 45.88% equity, which means that if the hand were dealt to the river a million times you would win about 459,000 of them.
Suit configuration moves it more than most players expect. Aces against kings is 82.64% when the aces share both suits with the kings and 81.26% when they share none, because sharing blocks the smaller pair's flush outs. Published figures quote one number per hand class and hide that spread.
Equity alone does not decide a call. It has to be compared against the price, which is what pot odds are for, and against what you can win later, which is implied odds.
Where the numbers come from
Related terms in poker
- Pot odds — The price a call is getting, compared against how often it needs to win.
- Outs — The cards remaining that would improve your hand to a likely winner.
- Implied odds — The money you expect to win later if your draw comes in, beyond what is in the pot now.
- Position — Where you act in the betting order, and the largest structural edge in poker.
- Button — The dealer position, which acts last on every postflop street.
- Cutoff — The seat immediately to the right of the button.
Where an entry quotes a number, that figure comes from the computed sections of this site rather than from another glossary, so the definition and the derivation cannot drift apart. Each entry links to the page where the number is worked out.