A4s vs 86s: preflop equity

The exact count puts A4s at 56.10% and 86s at 43.90% when the two hands see all five board cards.

A4s

56.10%

Wins 55.85%, ties 0.51%

86s

43.90%

Wins 43.64%, ties 0.51%

Equity counts a tie as half a win. Exact over every board.

A4s against 86s: the numbers

Exact preflop results for A4s against 86s, in percent
HandWinsTiesLosesEquity
A4s55.8470.51243.64156.103
86s43.6410.51255.84743.897

Both hands are suited hands: A4s and 86s. The two hands share no rank, which makes this a pure matchup of card strength, straight chances and flush chances.

A4s is ahead, but 86s is far from dead: it takes 436 of every 1,000 deals outright. About 0.51% of boards chop the pot, which is why equity sits slightly above the win figure for both hands.

A4s ranks number 35 of 169 starting hands, and 86s ranks number 110, by equity against a random hand.

Boards behind the percentages: 27,396,864 counted in all
HandBoards won, aboutBoards tied, aboutBoards lost, about
A4s15,300,000140,00011,956,000
86s11,956,000140,00015,300,000

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.

A4s against 86s read as odds
HandEquity as odds (to 1)Wins one deal inLoses one deal inPot odds needed to call (to 1)
A4s1.2781.7912.2910.782
86s0.7822.2911.7911.278

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

Paired flops are the best for A4s (61.97%); low rainbow flops (nine high or lower) are the worst (36.08%). The lead reverses on low rainbow flops (nine high or lower): there 86s is the favorite even though A4s is ahead overall.

A4s against 86s by flop texture, in percent
FlopShare of flopsA4s winsTies86s winsA4s equity
Rainbow, ten or higher25.22059.3630.20940.42859.467
Rainbow, nine or lower5.68935.7400.67463.58636.077
Two-tone46.72754.7060.26845.02654.840
Monotone5.27352.0703.43044.50053.785
Paired17.09161.6360.67337.69161.973

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

Relative to a random opponent, A4s changes by -2.93 points (baseline 59.03%) and 86s by -2.34 points (baseline 46.24%).

A4s and 86s here compared with each against a random hand, in percent
CaseEquity hereAgainst a random handChange in pointsTimes the random-hand equity
A4s, all flops56.10359.034-2.9310.95035
A4s, rainbow, ten or higher59.46759.034+0.4331.00733
A4s, rainbow, nine or lower36.07759.034-22.9570.61112
A4s, two-tone54.84059.034-4.1940.92896
A4s, monotone53.78559.034-5.2490.91109
A4s, paired61.97359.034+2.9391.04978
86s, all flops43.89746.243-2.3460.94927
86s, rainbow, ten or higher40.53346.243-5.7100.87652
86s, rainbow, nine or lower63.92346.243+17.6801.38233
86s, two-tone45.16046.243-1.0830.97658
86s, monotone46.21546.243-0.0280.99939
86s, paired38.02746.243-8.2160.82233

Does a shared suit matter?

Looking only at deals where the hands share a suit, A4s has 57.87%; looking only at deals where they do not, 55.51%. A4s does better with a shared suit, by 2.36 points.

A4s against 86s by suit overlap, in percent
DealsSpecific dealsShare of dealsA4s winsTies86s winsA4s equity
Share a suit425.0057.5740.59241.83457.870
No shared suit1275.0055.2710.48644.24355.514

How often this matchup comes up

A4s against 86s is made up of 16 specific-card matchups in one seat order, 0.0010% of the 1,624,350 ordered deals, and 32 counting both seat orders, 0.0020%.

A worked example

Say each player puts $100 in before the flop, making a $200 pot. On average A4s takes back $112.20 of it, which is $12.20 more than it put in, and 86s takes back $87.80, $12.20 less than it put in.

Per 1,000 deals: A4s wins about 559, 86s wins about 436, and about 5 end in a split pot.

The same matchup from the other side

One page covers both views. From 86s' side the equity is 43.90%, and from A4s' side it is 56.10%.

The calculator link fills in As4s against 8h6h, 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.

How this was computed

The figures are counted, not estimated: 1,712,304 boards for every suit pattern of the 16 specific deals, with both seven-card hands compared each time. Equity gives half a win for a tie. For the flop rows, a board is counted once under each of the ten flops inside it.

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

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