Poker is a card game played between a small number of players around a table. The players place bets into a pot, or pool of chips, until one player has all the chips or everyone folds. The game is a mix of strategy, betting, and bluffing. The goal is to win by forming the best possible five-card hand from the cards you have in your possession and the community cards on the table. A good poker player will vary their style, betting, and bluffing to keep opponents guessing about what is in their hand.
Before the cards are dealt, there is an initial round of betting, which is triggered by 2 mandatory bets called blinds placed into the pot by the two players to the left of the dealer. After the first round of betting, 5 community cards are revealed on the table (the flop). Players may then choose to discard and draw new cards to replace their old ones, or simply hold on to their current hand.
The game of poker has many different variations, but the basic rules are very similar across all of them. The game originated in the 17th century from a variety of earlier vying games such as Primero (16th – 17th centuries, Spanish), Flux and Post (French, 17th – 18th centuries), and Brag (18th – 19th centuries). Poker became popular in America in the late 1860s and has spread to most countries on earth.