If you’re looking to take your poker game up a notch, learning how to use push fold charts is essential. These handy tools allow you to quickly and easily determine the best course of action in any given situation, giving you a major edge over your opponents.
Whether you’re just starting or are an experienced player, using push fold charts can help improve your win rate significantly.
Push Fold Charts for Poker Tournaments: A Beginner’s Guide
It is common in poker tournaments.
Your stack becomes short and you have only two preflop options: push all-in or fold.
One thing that sets tournament crushers apart from average joes is their ability to play optimally in push-or-fold situations.
This article will cover:
- What is Push/Fold Strategy
- ICMIZER and Chip EV Explained
- 10bbb Push/Fold charts
- 15bbb Push/Fold charts
- Conclusion
Let’s get started.
What is Push/Fold Strategy
Push/Fold is a strategy that you can use in tournaments. It allows you to either fold or go all-in preflop. When your stack is short, push/fold should be used — around 15 big blinds or less.
There are many push/fold charts, but we will only be using the ICMIZER program to get our data. Keep in mind that these charts are not the only ones that can be used to help you push/fold poker.
The optimal push/fold range can change based on a variety of factors, including but certainly not limited to:
- Stack sizes behind.
- Ante size.
- The tournament structure.
- Conditions for ICM.
ICMIZER and the Chip EV explained
These ranges are generated by ICMIZER, which measures the expected value in chips (chipEV or simply cEV) for each hand played as a push. Chip EV is measured by big blinds.
If the hand you want to push is higher than +0.2cEV, it’s a great time to all-in. This would translate into a long-term win rate of 20bb per 100 hands.
This is an amazing win rate that’s too good to miss.
10bb push/Fold charts
We will discuss the push/fold ranges of the following positions at a nine-handed table:
- Under the Gun (UTG), and UTG+1
- UTG+2 & Lojack
- Hijack
- Cutoff and Button
- Small Blind
Note UTG/UTG+1 Middle Position/Lojack and Cutoff/Button are all grouped as the push/fold ranges for these position pairs are almost identical.
UTG and UTG+1 (10bb)
Light Green = Profitable All-In
These results show that the *slam-dunk* all-in hands are highlighted in bright yellow because they are above +0.2cEV. If played as a push, the hands highlighted in light-colored have a positive expectation. However, the profit is not large enough to justify risking your stack.
UTG+2 & Lojack (10bb)
Light Green = Profitable All-In
Hijack (10bb)
Light Green = Profitable All-In
Button and Cutoff (10bb)
Light Green = Profitable All-In
Small Blind (10bb)
Light Green = Profitable All-In
You can see in the screen grabs by ICMIZER that the more you move around the table, the wider the profit margin you can push all in.
This is mainly because you have fewer players to push into. You are more likely to push your 10bb stack through two players than you need to through seven.
A stronger range is required to push from Under the Gun because if someone calls you, they will have a greater range. After all, you have a tighter range.
15bbb Push/Fold charts
Same positions as last year:
- Under the Gun (UTG), and UTG+1
- UTG+2 & Lojack
- Hijack
- Cutoff and Button
- Small Blind
UTG & UTG+1 (15bb)
Light Green = Profitable All-In
Lojack (15bb), UTG+2 (and Lojack (15bb)
Light Green = Profitable All-In
Hijack (15bb)
Light Green = Profitable All-In
Button & Cutoff (15bb).
Light Green = Profitable All-In
Small Blind (15bb).
Light Green = Profitable All-In
You may have noticed that there are significant differences between pushing all-in with 10bb and 15bb. Push / Fold should be used only when you are slightly deeper than 10bb. This will allow you to become more comfortable with your post-flop game (which UpswingLab will help you develop!).
When stack sizes are larger than 20bb, there are more +EV lines that you can take by Raising First In.
2 Observations from the Push Fold Diagrams Above
1. Avoid jamming your weak offsuit aces.
This is a huge problem for newer players. As you can see, UTG and middle positions are losing pushes to weak aces, even with 10bb stacks. They are often dominated and do not perform well when the push call is made.
This is why a hand such as JT is WAY more all-in than, say A 3. Jack-Ten suited flips against almost all Ace-x hands, all pairs below 99 and has some equity vs QQ+ and AK.
But don’t take my word for this. The equities below show that JTs has nearly 40% equity, which is a strong range.
A3o has a quarter of the equity in comparison to the same range:
2. Your chip EV is higher than players who call too tight or all-ins.
This can be demonstrated best by using a small blind vs. big blind example. You will win more chipEV if you push as hard as you can from the small blind but the big blind isn’t calling as often as he should.
The big blind’s equilibrium calling range is different from the 10bb all in from the small blind.
Light Green = Profitable Call
As you can see, the big blind is supposed to call very wide.
However, in practice, many players don’t call with marginal hands such as J9o or Q2s, especially at low stakes. If your opponent folds hands like this, your marginal hands will win more chips if you go all-in than ICMIZER originally calculated.
Conclusion
Thanks for reading our guide on push fold charts! We hope you found it helpful and that it will help you win more hands at the poker table. Remember, using these tools is just one part of becoming a successful player — be sure to also practice good strategy and learn as much as you can about the game.
Good luck!