Finding A Full Pay Video Poker Machine Online

If you are reading this and have no clue what we are talking about, good. It means you are in the right place to find the mobile and online video poker games with the best odds of paying out. Ever asked around as to how to win video poker? This is the start of that how.

Here we will explain what is a full pay video poker game and how to find them among the crowds.

What is a full pay video poker game?

A full pay video poker machine is a fancy way of saying ‘this machine pays back better than all the other machines’.

How much online video poker pays back is often represented in percentage. A full pay Jacks or Better video poker game, for example, has a 99.54% return to player rate. That’s ridiculously high for a casino game – consider that most slots tend to be around the 95% mark.

All this means is that the house gets 0.46% of the total amount spent on the machine in its’ lifetime. This amount is theoretical, but without going too much into the maths, the less the casino gets the more chance you have of walking out with cash in your pocket.

Read on as we help you spot those machines at a casino online.

How can I find a full pay video poker machine?

With some difficulty, unless you simply know. This is why most people research the type of video poker they like best (Bonus Poker, Jack’s or Better, Deuce Wilds) and then look for a machine with a full pay table.

In online and mobile video poker you can sometimes see the theoretical return in the ‘rules’ section of the game, though not all machines have this. Still, worth a look.

Below we’ve outline some of the best full pay video poker machines. Bear in mind that there are hundreds of possible pay tables, each of which will change the odds slightly. These are guidelines only.

Full pay Jacks or Better Video Poker or 9/6 machines

Why 9/6 machines? Well, it’s a little clue as to what you should look out for. You’ll need to look at full house and flush to get an idea of whether this machine is ‘full pay’. The full house should be 9 times your bet and the flush should be 6 times your bet.

As most machines are derivatives of the Jacks or Better game, as a general rule, if you simply try and find 9/6 machines you are likely to be on the right track.

Full pay Bonus Video Poker or 8/5 machines

With any kind of bonus poker you always have to be careful about the variations between the different ‘bonus’ payouts. Still, as a general rule if you want a 98% return and above, a good clue is to look at the full house and the flush.

The full house should pay 8 times your bet and the flush 5 times your bet.

Full pay Double Bonus Video Poker or 10/7/5 machines

When played with the absolutely perfect strategy the 10/7/5 machine is the holy grail of video poker games giving you a potential 100.2% return. Again, it’s the full house, the flush and the straight you need to look at, with the full house paying 10 times your bet, the flush 7 times your bet and the straight 5 times your bet.

There is a huge amount of variety in double bonus video poker. So don’t walk away if you don’t see the 10/7/5, which is a hard machine to find anyway. Suitable alternatives that give you close to 99% returns are: 7/5/4, 9/7/5 and 10/7/4.

Full pay Double Double Bonus Video Poker or 10/6 machines

Similar to the one above, there is one double double bonus poker machine to rule them all: the 10/6 with close to 100.01% returns if played with the perfect strategy.

These can also be found in the simple double bonus machines, and as you can see, the returns are equally appealing. Don’t forget that these are theoretical returns based on you playing perfectly; something that may take years of practice to get right.

Suitable alternatives are the 9/6 which gives close to 99% return and 8/6 which is closer to 98%.

Full pay Joker Video Poker

There are quite a few different types of these machines, so watch out carefully for the paytable.

Joker Poker with two pairs as the lowest winning hand: Have a look at the straight flush and four of a kind. The best ones are 50/20 machines with 99% returns. 100/16 machines are also ok, with a 97-98% rate, but watch out for 40/15 machines which go incredibly low at 92-93%. Avoid, avoid.

Joker Poker with Aces or Better: The flush and full house is the key here. 9/5 machines, if we can find them, are the only one we think are worth playing. 8/5 are ok with 96.87% return, but that’s averagely quite low for video poker games.

Joker Poker with King or Better: The best joker machines to find, here you can actually get 100.6% return if you play perfectly. The full house should be 7 times your bet and the flush 5 times your bet, or 7/5 machines. If you can find one that has 200 times your bet on five of a kind then you are especially lucky. 8/5 and 6/5 machines are a suitable alternative with returns around the 98% mark.

Full pay Deuce Wild Video Poker or 15/9 machine

Another rare machine, the numbers you are looking for here are not the full house and the flush, which are relatively and usually quite low. For Deuce Wild machines you are really looking at the five of a kind and the straight flush.

The absolutely ideal situation? 15 times your bet on a five of a kind and 9 times your bet on the straight flush. However, you’ll rarely see these video poker machines out of Nevada, never mind online.

Realistically you’ll be looking for 16/10 or 15/10 machines, which also give you a good 98-99% edge and are very worthwhile hunting down.

Full pay Aces & Eights Video Poker or 25/8 machines

For Aces & Eights, the number to look at is the four of a kind and full house. The ideal machine will give you 25 times your bet on a four of a kind and 8 times your bet on a full house.

There are a couple of variations which can also bring you decent, though slightly lower odds, with 20/8 or 25/7 machines.

Full pay Aces & Faces Video Poker or 8/5 machines

A good alternative for those who want to branch out from the traditional Jacks or Better video poker games, Aces and Faces give you equally good odds at over 99% returns.

And so we are back at looking at the full house and flush, with the full house paying 8 times your bet and flush paying five times your bet. Slightly lower 7/6 and 7/5 machines bring down the odds by a decimal point or two and are still pretty decent video poker games in our opinion. However, we personally wouldn’t go any lower.

Full pay video poker tips

The best video poker tip we can give you is that you should always try and play the maximum amount of coins possible (usually 5) to increase your odds.

Most of these machines will pay proportionally more for larger hands if you play with the full 5 credits. This doesn’t mean you have to bet higher (never, ever bet more than you can afford to lose) just that to increase your odds, it’s better to play 5 coins at 0.50 than one coin at 2.50. Both bets are only 2.50 a hand of poker, but your odds of winning a bigger jackpot are greater with the 5 coins.

We have more tips for you after our video poker Strategy session, which should be your next step forward.

Next up: Online and mobile video poker strategies »