The Ace is the only card that can count low (below 2) or high (above K) in poker - it doesn't count 1/11 (that's blackjack.) However, it's only in straights (or in some lowball poker variants). Note that suits are irrelevant for Ace to Five low. A flush or straight does not ‘break’ an Ace to Five low poker hand. Aces are always a ‘low’ card when considering a low hand. Please also note that the value of a five-card low hand starts with the top card, and goes down from there. Five Low, or Wheel: The Five, Four, Three, Deuce.

All the suits in poker are of equal value. It makes no difference whether someone has the ace of clubs or the ace of diamonds. If remaining players have exactly the same hand at showdown, only in different suits, the pot is split.

Hand Ranking

The value of poker hands is determined by how rare or common it is to be dealt them, with the most common hands valued lower than the rarer hands. The complete list of poker hands is as follows, in increasing order of scarcity:

Poker Ace Straight Rules

1. High card
2. One pair
3. Two pair
4. Three of a kind (sometimes called “trips” or “a set”)
5. Straight
6. Flush
7. Full house
8. Four of a kind (sometimes called “quads”)
9. Straight flush

High Card

If you have no pair, three of a kind, straight, flush, full house, etc., then the highest card in your hand is considered to be decisive. The hand above, in which the best card is a king and there is no other combination of poker hand, is known as “king high”.

Ace high beats king high. King high beats queen high, and so on.

If the high cards in two players’ hands is the same, the second-highest card becomes decisive. If these cards are also the same, the third-highest card plays and so on. These cards are known as the kicker.

High card ace, king kicker:

Poker Hands Ace Low Straight

Player 1 has A♠K♣
Player 2 has A♦Q♦
The board is 9♠6♥4♥3♠2♣

Poker Straight Ace Low

Both players have an ace, but Player 1 wins, because he has a king as his second highest card (kicker). His opponent only has a queen.