Poker is a card game with millions of fans worldwide. The game is based on incomplete information, in which players make decisions under uncertainty, and it requires an understanding of probability and statistics. In poker, players bet by placing chips into a pot, and they win by making the best five-card hand using their own two cards and the five community cards. In addition, they may bluff by betting when they don’t have the best hand, thereby forcing other players to call their bets or fold. A good poker player must also know how to read other players and watch for tells, which are unconscious habits that reveal information about a player’s hand.

Before the cards are dealt, the rules of the specific poker variant being played may require each player to contribute an initial contribution to the pot, called an ante. Then, each player is dealt two cards and the betting begins. A player can call, raise the bet, or check (not put any chips into the pot). He or she can also bet all in, meaning that he or she will place all of his or her remaining chips into the pot.

You deal yourself a pair of kings off the flop. You think you’re pretty good, but you’re not sure what the others have. Brad kept two, which means he probably has a pair, and Dennis raised the pot, so he must be trying for three of a kind or a flush.