PokerToast · study tools for mixed-game poker

Razz strategy and study tools

Razz is seven card stud where the lowest hand wins: aces are low, and straights and flushes don't count against you. The best possible hand is 5-4-3-2-A.

PokerToast is a study tool for mixed-game players: you practice decisions and see what a trained solver does. There is no real-money play.

Razz starting hands: what the solver does

The heads-up solver's most frequent play in 13 common 3rd-street spots. "How often" is a mix: the solver plays some hands more than one way. "Not settled" means another play measured better, so treat that answer as uncertain. Each row opens the full answer: the solver's numbers, how they were made, and the common advice where we found one.

Numbers from PokerToast's own trained solver (version R-3690500-20261005095629): trained by self-play, not a solved game; heads-up limit only; similar hands are grouped, so a number is for the group, not your exact cards. All of these spots in one table, with what each play is worth.

What PokerToast's solver knows about Razz

PokerToast trained its own Razz solvers for limit betting (at most four bets per street) by self-play (Monte Carlo counterfactual regret minimization). A solver learns how often to fold, check, call, bet or raise in each situation, and then each play's value is measured by playing the situation out many times.

• Heads-up (2 players): Trained and in use (35,165 situations learned, 3,690,500 training iterations). For each decision it looks at the street; your hand (a made 8-or-better low and how good it is, or how many cards you have toward an 8-low and how many of the low cards you need your opponent already shows); your opponent's board (how many high cards, "bricks", and their highest low card); the size of the pot; and the betting so far on this street.
• 3-handed: Trained and in use (172,805 situations learned, 25,358,751 training iterations). Built the same way, but compares your hand with the strongest live opponent board and also looks at how many opponents are left and how many act after you.

Limits, honestly: the solvers group similar hands together, so their numbers are for the group, not your exact cards; they play limit only; there is no solver for 4 or more players yet; and every "worth" number assumes an opponent who plays like the solver, not like the players at your table.

Real example spots

These are recent Daily Spots for Razz: hands dealt by the Bot Lab engine, with the decision picked and graded by the trained heads-up solver. The answers are hidden until you open them.

The Bot Lab for Razz

• Play Razz against bots at a table of 2 to 6 players (log in first): Razz is on the Free plan.
• Heads-up at the default limit stakes, the bot plays the trained solver strategy.
• 3-handed at the default limit stakes, the bots play the 3-handed solver strategy. Bigger tables use simple rule bots.
• Bot personalities: shark, fish, rock and maniac (or a secret mix), to practice against different styles.
• Hints (Pro plan): while you play, how often the solver takes each action and what each is worth, where a solver exists for your table size (free accounts: 1 a day).
• My hands (Pro plan): your decisions compared with the solver (every spot it has learned), a skill score (chips lost per 100 hands compared with the solver) and your playing style.
• Table read: each opponent's likely style, the plays that gave it away, and how to adjust.

The Calculator for Razz

• The Research Calculator (PC site): lists every hand an opponent could hold in Razz, lets you narrow them down into a range, and works out your equity against it, street by street.
• Its Solver tab: for a heads-up limit spot you set up, how often the solver takes each action and what each is worth (free accounts: 3 lookups a day; the Study plan has no limit).
• The free Razz equity calculator: your cards against your opponents' up cards or the board, worked out on the server, no sign-up.
• The free equity calculator: your cards against your opponents' cards, no sign-up: open it for Razz.

Try it

Today's Razz Daily Spot Free equity calculator Open PokerToast

Bot Lab: open PokerToast, log in, choose Play Bots, then pick Razz and the number of players.

Other games: Stud · Stud 8 · Hold'em · Omaha 8

Solver answers to common Razz questions: the Razz Reference.