How do you play pocket fives?

Pocket fives is a small pair you open from the hijack onward and only sometimes under the gun, and it is almost entirely a set-mining hand once there is action.

Pocket Fives

Speculative

60.3%

Equity vs a random hand

6

Combos (of 1,326)

4/5

Seats that open it

Open it as a first-in raise from the hijack onward, and only now and then under the gun, but understand what it is once the pot gets contested: a hand that wants to flop a set and otherwise give up. Calling a raise is fine when the stacks are deep enough to win a big pot the one time in eight you hit. The pair of fives rarely wins at showdown unfaced, so do not build a big pot with it on its own.

In the GTO solver's 6-max ranges this hand opens for a raise from the hijack, the cutoff, the button and the small blind, and sometimes from UTG.

Common mistake: Paying too much to set-mine. If the stacks are shallow, calling a raise with fives loses money, because the set does not pay enough to cover all the times you miss.

Quick tip: Hit your set roughly one in eight. No set, no hand, most of the time.