--- title: "97s vs 43s: preflop equity" url: "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/97s-vs-43s.md" canonical_url: "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/97s-vs-43s" last_updated: "2026-10-23" type: "reference" summary: "97s is a big favorite over 43s before the flop: 63.53% to 36.47% equity, counted exactly over every board, with the split by flop type and suit." related: ["https://georgelipoker.com/equity/87s-vs-43s.md", "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/97s-vs-53s.md", "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/22-vs-43s.md"] --- # 97s vs 43s: preflop equity 97s is a big favorite over 43s before the flop: 63.53% to 36.47% equity, counted exactly over every board, with the split by flop type and suit. The exact count puts 97s at 63.53% and 43s at 36.47% when the two hands see all five board cards. ## 97s against 43s: the numbers **Exact preflop results for 97s against 43s, in percent** | Hand | Wins | Ties | Loses | Equity | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | 97s | 62.080 | 2.901 | 35.019 | 63.531 | | 43s | 35.019 | 2.901 | 62.080 | 36.469 | This is a contest between two suited hands, 97s and 43s. The two hands share no rank, which makes this a pure matchup of card strength, straight chances and flush chances. A 27.06 point lead is real, and 43s still takes about 350 of every 1,000 deals outright. The tie share is 2.90%: on those boards the pot is chopped and neither hand wins outright. By strength against a random hand, 97s holds place 94 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 | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | 97s | 17,008,000 | 795,000 | 9,594,000 | | 43s | 9,594,000 | 795,000 | 17,008,000 | 16 specific deals times 1,712,304 boards gives the exact total. The won, tied and lost counts are approximations from the five-decimal percentages, rounded to the nearest thousand. **97s 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) | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | 97s | 1.742 | 1.611 | 2.856 | 0.574 | | 43s | 0.574 | 2.856 | 1.611 | 1.742 | 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 Split by what the flop looks like, 97s peaks at 64.85% on rainbow flops topped by a ten or better and bottoms out at 60.97% on monotone flops. 97s stays ahead on all five textures. **97s against 43s by flop texture, in percent** | Flop | Share of flops | 97s wins | Ties | 43s wins | 97s equity | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Rainbow, ten or higher | 25.844 | 63.747 | 2.207 | 34.046 | 64.850 | | Rainbow, nine or lower | 5.065 | 61.741 | 0.599 | 37.660 | 62.040 | | Two-tone | 46.727 | 62.416 | 1.739 | 35.845 | 63.286 | | Monotone | 5.273 | 58.673 | 4.585 | 36.742 | 60.965 | | Paired | 17.091 | 59.793 | 7.291 | 32.916 | 63.439 | Read the flop types this way: rainbow has three suits, two-tone has two cards of one suit, monotone has three, and paired repeats a rank. ## Compared with a random hand Each hand has a baseline against a random hand: 49.12% for 97s, 38.64% for 43s. Here the change is +14.41 and -2.17 points. **97s 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 | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | 97s, all flops | 63.531 | 49.118 | +14.413 | 1.29344 | | 97s, rainbow, ten or higher | 64.850 | 49.118 | +15.732 | 1.32029 | | 97s, rainbow, nine or lower | 62.040 | 49.118 | +12.922 | 1.26308 | | 97s, two-tone | 63.286 | 49.118 | +14.168 | 1.28845 | | 97s, monotone | 60.965 | 49.118 | +11.847 | 1.24119 | | 97s, paired | 63.439 | 49.118 | +14.321 | 1.29156 | | 43s, all flops | 36.469 | 38.642 | -2.173 | 0.94377 | | 43s, rainbow, ten or higher | 35.150 | 38.642 | -3.492 | 0.90963 | | 43s, rainbow, nine or lower | 37.960 | 38.642 | -0.682 | 0.98235 | | 43s, two-tone | 36.714 | 38.642 | -1.928 | 0.95011 | | 43s, monotone | 39.035 | 38.642 | +0.393 | 1.01017 | | 43s, paired | 36.561 | 38.642 | -2.081 | 0.94615 | ## Does a shared suit matter? When the hands share a suit, 97s holds 65.96%; when they do not, it holds 62.72%. 97s does better with a shared suit, by 3.24 points. **97s against 43s by suit overlap, in percent** | Deals | Specific deals | Share of deals | 97s wins | Ties | 43s wins | 97s equity | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Share a suit | 4 | 25.00 | 64.400 | 3.119 | 32.481 | 65.960 | | No shared suit | 12 | 75.00 | 61.307 | 2.828 | 35.865 | 62.721 | ## How often this matchup comes up Counting specific cards, 97s against 43s appears in 16 of the 1,624,350 ordered heads-up deals (0.0010%), and in 32 when the seats are swapped too (0.0020%). ## A worked example With $100 from each side, the $200 pot is split on average as $127.06 for 97s and $72.94 for 43s; the first side gains $27.06 per all-in and the second gives up $27.06. Per 1,000 deals: 97s wins about 621, 43s wins about 350, and about 29 end in a split pot. ## The same matchup from the other side The mirror image, 43s against 97s, is 36.47% to 63.53%, and its address redirects to this page. ## Keep exploring 9s7s against 4h3h is a ready-made deal for the calculator, with no suit in common between the hands. The neighboring matchups below replace one hand with another of similar strength. - [Open 9s7s against 4h3h in the equity calculator](https://georgelipoker.com/tools/equity-calculator.md#p1=9s7s&p2=4h3h) - [97s combos](https://georgelipoker.com/combos/97s.md) - [43s combos](https://georgelipoker.com/combos/43s.md) - [87s vs 43s](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/87s-vs-43s.md) - [97s vs 53s](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/97s-vs-53s.md) - [22 vs 43s](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/22-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 - [87s vs 43s: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/87s-vs-43s.md) - [97s vs 53s: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/97s-vs-53s.md) - [22 vs 43s: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/22-vs-43s.md)