Poker is a card game played by two or more players. The goal is to form a hand with five cards that beats everyone else’s hand. This is done by placing bets in the pot, which is the sum of all the players’ bets at the table. The best hand wins the pot.

To begin, each player places an ante into the pot, after which they are dealt two cards. They can then choose to hold these cards or discard them and take new ones from the deck. Then a round of betting takes place. Players can also bluff and raise bets to price out weaker hands.

The first step to becoming a strong poker player is understanding ranges. While new players will often try to put their opponent on a specific hand, more experienced players will look at the entire selection of possible cards that their opponent could have and work out how likely it is that they will be able to make a better hand than theirs.

The next step is learning how to read your opponents’ behavior and body language. This can be done by studying the by-play of poker games and looking for famous tells that poker players frequently display. Finally, it’s important to spend time mastering bet sizing. A bet that is too high will turn off other players and a bet that’s too small won’t scare them away enough to get them to call you.