--- title: "ATo vs 98s: preflop equity" url: "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/ato-vs-98s.md" canonical_url: "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/ato-vs-98s" last_updated: "2026-10-23" type: "reference" summary: "Who is ahead, ATo or 98s? ATo leads 59.39% to 40.61% before the flop, counted exactly over every board, with the split by flop type and suit." related: ["https://georgelipoker.com/equity/ato-vs-22.md", "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/ato-vs-97s.md", "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/kjs-vs-98s.md"] --- # ATo vs 98s: preflop equity Who is ahead, ATo or 98s? ATo leads 59.39% to 40.61% before the flop, counted exactly over every board, with the split by flop type and suit. The exact count puts ATo at 59.39% and 98s at 40.61% when the two hands see all five board cards. ## ATo against 98s: the numbers **Exact preflop results for ATo against 98s, in percent** | Hand | Wins | Ties | Loses | Equity | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | ATo | 59.181 | 0.416 | 40.403 | 59.389 | | 98s | 40.403 | 0.416 | 59.181 | 40.611 | One side is an offsuit hand, the other is a suited hand. Neither hand shares a rank with the other, so this is a contest of high cards, connection and suits. ATo is ahead, but 98s is far from dead: it takes 404 of every 1,000 deals outright. The tie share is 0.42%: on those boards the pot is chopped and neither hand wins outright. Place 19 of 169 belongs to ATo and place 83 belongs to 98s in the ranking against a random hand. **Boards behind the percentages: 82,190,592 counted in all** | Hand | Boards won, about | Boards tied, about | Boards lost, about | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | ATo | 48,641,000 | 342,000 | 33,207,000 | | 98s | 33,207,000 | 342,000 | 48,641,000 | The total is exact: 48 specific deals times 1,712,304 boards. The three counts are approximate, worked out from the percentages to five decimals and rounded to the nearest thousand. **ATo against 98s read as odds** | Hand | Equity as odds (to 1) | Wins one deal in | Loses one deal in | Pot odds needed to call (to 1) | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | ATo | 1.462 | 1.690 | 2.475 | 0.684 | | 98s | 0.684 | 2.475 | 1.690 | 1.462 | The last column is the smallest pot odds, written as a pot-to-call ratio, at which a call breaks even with this equity. ## Who is ahead on which flops If you know the kind of flop that came, the numbers shift: ATo holds 65.89% on rainbow flops topped by a ten or better and 39.07% on low rainbow flops (nine high or lower). On low rainbow flops (nine high or lower) the numbers flip and 98s is the one ahead. **ATo against 98s by flop texture, in percent** | Flop | Share of flops | ATo wins | Ties | 98s wins | ATo equity | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Rainbow, ten or higher | 24.717 | 65.804 | 0.181 | 34.015 | 65.894 | | Rainbow, nine or lower | 6.313 | 38.819 | 0.509 | 60.672 | 39.074 | | Two-tone | 46.667 | 57.599 | 0.231 | 42.170 | 57.714 | | Monotone | 5.212 | 56.558 | 2.348 | 41.094 | 57.732 | | Paired | 17.091 | 62.245 | 0.637 | 37.118 | 62.563 | 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 Against one random hand instead, ATo holds 62.72% and 98s holds 50.80%. Facing each other changes that by -3.33 points for ATo and -10.19 points for 98s. **ATo and 98s 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 | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | ATo, all flops | 59.389 | 62.722 | -3.333 | 0.94686 | | ATo, rainbow, ten or higher | 65.894 | 62.722 | +3.172 | 1.05057 | | ATo, rainbow, nine or lower | 39.074 | 62.722 | -23.648 | 0.62297 | | ATo, two-tone | 57.714 | 62.722 | -5.008 | 0.92016 | | ATo, monotone | 57.732 | 62.722 | -4.990 | 0.92044 | | ATo, paired | 62.563 | 62.722 | -0.159 | 0.99747 | | 98s, all flops | 40.611 | 50.801 | -10.190 | 0.79941 | | 98s, rainbow, ten or higher | 34.106 | 50.801 | -16.695 | 0.67136 | | 98s, rainbow, nine or lower | 60.926 | 50.801 | +10.125 | 1.19931 | | 98s, two-tone | 42.286 | 50.801 | -8.515 | 0.83239 | | 98s, monotone | 42.268 | 50.801 | -8.533 | 0.83203 | | 98s, paired | 37.437 | 50.801 | -13.364 | 0.73693 | ## Does a shared suit matter? Suit overlap shows up in the numbers. With a suit in common ATo has 60.04% equity, and with none in common it has 58.73%. ATo does better with a shared suit, by 1.31 points. **ATo against 98s by suit overlap, in percent** | Deals | Specific deals | Share of deals | ATo wins | Ties | 98s wins | ATo equity | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Share a suit | 24 | 50.00 | 59.815 | 0.457 | 39.728 | 60.044 | | No shared suit | 24 | 50.00 | 58.547 | 0.374 | 41.079 | 58.734 | ## How often this matchup comes up Out of 1,624,350 ways to deal two seats two cards each, 48 are ATo in one seat and 98s in the other (0.0030%); with the seats swapped too, 96 (0.0059%). ## A worked example Say each player puts $100 in before the flop, making a $200 pot. On average ATo takes back $118.78 of it, which is $18.78 more than it put in, and 98s takes back $81.22, $18.78 less than it put in. Out of 1,000 deals you should see around 592 outright wins for ATo, 404 for 98s, and 4 split pots. ## The same matchup from the other side 98s against ATo adds nothing new: it is 40.61% for 98s and 59.39% for ATo, the same figures reversed. ## Keep exploring AsTh against 9d8d 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 AsTh against 9d8d in the equity calculator](https://georgelipoker.com/tools/equity-calculator.md#p1=AsTh&p2=9d8d) - [ATo combos](https://georgelipoker.com/combos/ato.md) - [98s combos](https://georgelipoker.com/combos/98s.md) - [ATo vs 22](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/ato-vs-22.md) - [ATo vs 97s](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/ato-vs-97s.md) - [KJs vs 98s](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/kjs-vs-98s.md) - [All hand matchups](https://georgelipoker.com/equity.md) ## How this was computed Each figure is a complete count over boards. Take the 48 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 - [ATo vs 22: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/ato-vs-22.md) - [ATo vs 97s: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/ato-vs-97s.md) - [KJs vs 98s: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/kjs-vs-98s.md)