Poker is a card game in which players place bets on the outcome of a hand. The game can be played with two to 14 people. There are many variants of the game, but all of them involve betting and raising stakes. Players may also bluff, trying to win by making other players believe that they have a high-ranking hand when they actually do not.
In the game, each player starts with two cards, which are called hole cards. A round of betting then takes place, starting with the player to the left of the dealer. When the betting ends, the players show their hands and the winner is declared.
Depending on the rules of a particular poker variant, some players are required to place an initial amount of money into the pot before being dealt a hand. This is known as a forced bet and it comes in three forms: an ante, a blind, or a bring-in.
In addition to the initial forced bets, a player may raise the stake of a particular hand by placing chips into the pot in turn. However, the number of chips a player may raise must be at least equal to or higher than the total contribution made by the player who raised it before him. For this reason, it is often suggested that a player should raise his stake only if he believes that he has a strong enough hand to justify the bet or if the odds against drawing a better hand are less than the odds offered by the pot.