---
title: "86s vs 43s: preflop equity"
url: "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/86s-vs-43s.md"
canonical_url: "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/86s-vs-43s"
last_updated: "2026-10-23"
type: "reference"
summary: "86s is a big favorite over 43s before the flop: 63.23% to 36.78% equity, counted exactly over every board, with the split by flop type and suit."
related: ["https://georgelipoker.com/equity/76s-vs-43s.md", "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/86s-vs-53s.md", "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/87s-vs-43s.md"]
---

# 86s vs 43s: preflop equity

86s is a big favorite over 43s before the flop: 63.23% to 36.78% equity, counted exactly over every board, with the split by flop type and suit.

Counting every board, the equity split is 63.23% for 86s and 36.77% for 43s, so 86s leads by 26.46 points.

## 86s against 43s: the numbers

**Exact preflop results for 86s against 43s, in percent**

| Hand | Wins | Ties | Loses | Equity |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 86s | 60.951 | 4.548 | 34.501 | 63.225 |
| 43s | 34.501 | 4.548 | 60.951 | 36.775 |

This is a contest between two suited hands, 86s and 43s. The two hands share no rank, which makes this a pure matchup of card strength, straight chances and flush chances.

The lead is steady rather than large, and the flop still has plenty of say in who wins. The tie share is 4.55%: on those boards the pot is chopped and neither hand wins outright.

By strength against a random hand, 86s holds place 110 of 169 and 43s holds place 150.

**Boards behind the percentages: 27,396,864 counted in all**

| Hand | Boards won, about | Boards tied, about | Boards lost, about |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 86s | 16,699,000 | 1,246,000 | 9,452,000 |
| 43s | 9,452,000 | 1,246,000 | 16,699,000 |

The board total is exact, 16 deals at 1,712,304 boards each. Won, tied and lost counts are rounded to the nearest thousand from the five-decimal percentages.

**86s against 43s read as odds**

| Hand | Equity as odds (to 1) | Wins one deal in | Loses one deal in | Pot odds needed to call (to 1) |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 86s | 1.719 | 1.641 | 2.898 | 0.582 |
| 43s | 0.582 | 2.898 | 1.641 | 1.719 |

The final column gives the least the pot must offer for each unit called for a call to break even at this equity.

## Who is ahead on which flops

86s prefers rainbow flops topped by a ten or better, where it holds 64.31%, and likes monotone flops least, where it holds 60.88%. 86s stays ahead on all five textures.

**86s against 43s by flop texture, in percent**

| Flop | Share of flops | 86s wins | Ties | 43s wins | 86s equity |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Rainbow, ten or higher | 25.844 | 62.356 | 3.908 | 33.736 | 64.310 |
| Rainbow, nine or lower | 5.065 | 63.390 | 0.741 | 35.869 | 63.761 |
| Two-tone | 46.727 | 61.637 | 2.996 | 35.367 | 63.135 |
| Monotone | 5.273 | 58.165 | 5.422 | 36.413 | 60.876 |
| Paired | 17.091 | 57.088 | 10.615 | 32.297 | 62.395 |

Flop types: rainbow means three different suits, two-tone means one suit twice, monotone means one suit three times, paired means a repeated rank.

## Compared with a random hand

Each hand has a baseline against a random hand: 46.24% for 86s, 38.64% for 43s. Here the change is +16.99 and -1.87 points.

**86s and 43s here compared with each against a random hand, in percent**

| Case | Equity here | Against a random hand | Change in points | Times the random-hand equity |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| 86s, all flops | 63.225 | 46.243 | +16.982 | 1.36723 |
| 86s, rainbow, ten or higher | 64.310 | 46.243 | +18.067 | 1.39070 |
| 86s, rainbow, nine or lower | 63.761 | 46.243 | +17.518 | 1.37882 |
| 86s, two-tone | 63.135 | 46.243 | +16.892 | 1.36529 |
| 86s, monotone | 60.876 | 46.243 | +14.633 | 1.31644 |
| 86s, paired | 62.395 | 46.243 | +16.152 | 1.34929 |
| 43s, all flops | 36.775 | 38.642 | -1.867 | 0.95168 |
| 43s, rainbow, ten or higher | 35.690 | 38.642 | -2.952 | 0.92361 |
| 43s, rainbow, nine or lower | 36.239 | 38.642 | -2.403 | 0.93781 |
| 43s, two-tone | 36.865 | 38.642 | -1.777 | 0.95401 |
| 43s, monotone | 39.124 | 38.642 | +0.482 | 1.01247 |
| 43s, paired | 37.605 | 38.642 | -1.037 | 0.97316 |

## Does a shared suit matter?

Of the deals of this matchup, 4 share a suit (86s at 65.68%) and 12 do not (62.41%). 86s does better with a shared suit, by 3.27 points.

**86s against 43s by suit overlap, in percent**

| Deals | Specific deals | Share of deals | 86s wins | Ties | 43s wins | 86s equity |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Share a suit | 4 | 25.00 | 63.234 | 4.882 | 31.884 | 65.675 |
| No shared suit | 12 | 75.00 | 60.190 | 4.436 | 35.374 | 62.408 |

## How often this matchup comes up

This page stands for 16 specific-card matchups (0.0010% of 1,624,350 ordered deals), or 32 once you count the seats both ways (0.0020%).

## A worked example

A $100 all-in from each player makes a $200 pot, and the exact equity says 86s gets $126.46 of it on average and 43s gets $73.54.

In 1,000 deals of exactly this matchup, expect about 610 won outright by 86s, about 345 won outright by 43s and about 45 split.

## The same matchup from the other side

The reversed view, 43s against 86s, shows 36.77% for 43s and 63.23% for 86s. It is the same count, so it redirects here.

## Keep exploring

The calculator link fills in 8s6s against 4h3h, a deal where the two hands share no suit. Change any card to test your own hand. The neighboring matchups below swap one of the two hands for one of similar strength.

- [Open 8s6s against 4h3h in the equity calculator](https://georgelipoker.com/tools/equity-calculator.md#p1=8s6s&p2=4h3h)
- [86s combos](https://georgelipoker.com/combos/86s.md)
- [43s combos](https://georgelipoker.com/combos/43s.md)
- [76s vs 43s](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/76s-vs-43s.md)
- [86s vs 53s](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/86s-vs-53s.md)
- [87s vs 43s](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/87s-vs-43s.md)
- [All hand matchups](https://georgelipoker.com/equity.md)

## How this was computed

Each figure is a complete count over boards. Take the 16 specific deals, group them by suit pattern, deal all 1,712,304 boards against each, and compare the two seven-card hands. Equity counts a tie as half a win; the flop rows use every one of a board's ten flops.

Source: our own exact count from the GeorgeLiPoker poker math library. No outside data is used.

## Related

- [76s vs 43s: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/76s-vs-43s.md)
- [86s vs 53s: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/86s-vs-53s.md)
- [87s vs 43s: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/87s-vs-43s.md)