RULES: OMAHA
Omaha is similar to Hold'em in using a three-card flop on the board, a fourth board card, and then a fifth board card all face up. Each player is dealt four hole cards face down (instead of two) at the start. In order to make a hand, a player must use precisely two hole cards with three board cards. The betting is the same as in Hold'em, using pre-flop, flop, turn, and river betting rounds. At the showdown, all four hole cards should be shown to receive the pot. Similar to Hold’em, there are big and small blinds in Omaha along with a dealer button. Using TWO and only TWO of your hole cards makes things interesting and often can be a source of confusion for first time players. If the board has 4 hearts on it and you have the Ace of Hearts and no other hearts in the hole, you DO NOT have a flush. This is very important to make note of as you start to play Omaha and are looking to evaluate your hand and drawing chances as a beginner.
RULES OF OMAHA
1. All the rules of Hold'em apply to Omaha except the rule on playing the board, which is not possible in Omaha because you must use exactly two cards from your hole cards and three cards from the board.
RULES: OMAHA HIGH-LOW
Omaha is often played high-low split. The player may use any combination of two hole cards and three board cards for the high hand and another (or the same) combination of two hole cards and three board cards for the low hand.
RULES OF OMAHA HIGH-LOW
All the rules of Omaha apply to Omaha high-low split except as below.
A qualifier of 8-or-better for low is used. This means to win the low half of the pot, a player's hand at the showdown must have five cards of different ranks that are an eight or lower in rank. (An ace is the highest card and also the lowest card.) If there is no qualifying hand for low, the best high hand wins the whole pot.
It is important to note here that your low is determined by your lowest HIGH card (that is less than 8). For example, which of the two hands below is the winner of the low pot?
A,2,3,4,8
Or
2,4,5,6,7
The answer is the second hand, the hand that is 7-high. The 7 is lower than the 8 (the ace is counted low). Although at first glance and intuitively as a beginner you might imagine that the Ace makes the hand lower, it does not as the count is from top to bottom, not bottom to top. Your low in Omaha is only as low as your lowest HIGH card that is less than 8.
