Pot Limit Omaha or the Great Game of PLO as it’s passionately referred to by it’s biggest fans, is a very cool game to learn, much more of an action cash game and plays very well short handed.

Everyone is dealt 4 hole cards and the player must use two of these to make their hand, as appose to Hold’em where you can just use 1 or none of your hole cards to make the best hand possible using community cards.

If you are looking to learn a new game, this is one of the best mixed games to pick up after learning to play No-Limit Hold’em, so let’s look at some tips on how to play this great game…

Practice Good Starting Hand Selection

With so many more combinations of starting hands out there, they can all look quite pretty to us Hold’em degens, however there are 270,725 combinations of PLO hands, so we are going to want to be a little bit picky on which of these we play, as with any card game, playing too many hands is never good and we will leak chips.

Try and choose hands with nut suits, pairs to set mine and connectivity. Ideal hands have two things working for them i.e: A♠ 2♠ & Q♣ J♣ is an excellent starting hand with a nut flush possible, wheel draw, broadway cards and good connectivity between cards.

Dont’ Over Play Big Pairs

There are going to be times when the action gets heavy and you will have a hand with a high pair which may want to make you at least want to continue, but consider how well your hand plays in multiway pots and whether you can reraise for value preflop with it, if the answer is a double no, a disciplined laydown may be the right move. K♣ K♠ 2♦ 5♥ is a weak hand in this game, as without hitting a King you will nearly always hate any run out.

Play in Position

Much like No Limit Hold’em Position is vital in Pot Limit Omaha too! As players will often need to protect even the most strong hands like sets, straights and flushes on wet boards so having information that a player has checked is huge in this game.

On the flip side of that coin if you are the one playing out of position it is too easy to be exploited, so try and gain the betting lead with much stronger holdings if ever playing pots out of position.

Protect your good hands

Typically you are going to want to bet large with strong holdings to give your opponents a poor price to continue with their draws. Even full houses can be vulnerable hands in Pot Limit Omaha, so you are going to want to bet, bet, bet in this game to protect your hands from sick redraws like quads and straight flushes.

Be careful with your draws

You are going to have some big draws in PLO and get coolered by someone who just has the board locked up, but try and stay clear from paying someone off huge with hands like third nut flushes for example, players are often going to have a great deal of showdown, so many players are less likely to turn hands into bluffs and are often just potting boards for max value with their nutted hand. Try and pick your battles wisely when looking to draw.