Table Etiquette

The rules a dealer will enforce

1. Act in turn. Acting early tells the players between you and the action what you intend to do, and your action may be binding anyway.
2. One motion per bet. Push your chips forward once, or announce the amount before you move. See Betting Rounds and Bet Types for why string bets are disallowed.
3. Keep your cards on the table. Cards lifted off the felt can be seen by a neighbour; cards taken off the table are dead.
4. Protect your hand. A chip or your hand on top of your cards stops the dealer from mucking them by accident. Unprotected cards swept into the muck are dead, with no recourse.
5. Keep your chips visible and stacked. High denominations in front, nothing hidden behind a stack.
6. One player to a hand. No advice from a neighbour, no consulting a friend, no phone during a hand.
7. Show both cards at showdown. Turn them face up before releasing. A hand mucked face down cannot win, even if it was the best one.

Information you must not give away

• Do not discuss a hand in progress. Not even to say what you folded. Players still in the pot are entitled to equal information.
• Do not react to the board when you have folded. A sigh when the third heart lands tells the table something.
• Do not show your cards to a neighbour. In most rooms, showing one player means every player may ask to see them.
• Do not speculate aloud about what someone holds. It assists one player at the expense of another.
• Do not slow-roll. If you have the winning hand, turn it over promptly. Pausing for effect while an opponent believes they have won is the one breach that genuinely angers a table.

Pace of play

A card room makes its money from hands dealt per hour, and the other players are spending their evening at the table. Both have an interest in a game that moves.

• Think about your decision while the action approaches you, not only when it arrives.
• Take genuine time for genuinely difficult decisions. Nobody objects to a long think once; they object to one every hand.
• If you need an unusually long time, say “time” so the dealer knows you are still deciding.
• Post your blinds without being chased, and keep your attention on the table rather than a screen.
• Stack your chips so the dealer can count them without asking.

Chips, cash and the dealer

Table stakes

Only the chips on the table are in play. You cannot add money to a stack in the middle of a hand.

Going south

Secretly removing chips from your stack. It is prohibited everywhere and is grounds for being asked to leave.

Rat-holing

The same thing by another name.

The rake

The house’s cut, taken from each pot or charged by the half-hour. It is announced on the table sign.

Tipping

Customary in card rooms when you win a pot of reasonable size. A single small chip is normal; it is not expected on tiny pots.

Disagreements go to the floor supervisor, not to an argument between players. Ask the dealer to call the floor, state what happened without editorialising, and accept the ruling. Every room has rules you have not read, and the floor’s decision is final in theirs.

Home game conventions

Private games are more relaxed about manners and should be stricter about procedure, because there is no dealer to arbitrate. Settle these before the first hand rather than during an argument.

• Which variants will be dealt, and whether a dealer may choose the game.
• The buy-in, the maximum rebuy and when the game ends.
• Whether check-raising is allowed and whether there is a cap on raises.
• How misdeals, exposed cards and string bets are handled.
• Who shuffles, who cuts, and whether the deal rotates.
• How the last hand is announced, so that nobody leaves ahead on a surprise.

Agreeing the money rules in advance matters more than any of the above. See Bankroll Basics.