---
title: "K9s vs 43s: preflop equity"
url: "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/k9s-vs-43s.md"
canonical_url: "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/k9s-vs-43s"
last_updated: "2026-10-23"
type: "reference"
summary: "K9s is a big favorite over 43s before the flop: 63.20% to 36.80% equity, counted exactly over every board, with the split by flop type and suit."
related: ["https://georgelipoker.com/equity/a5s-vs-43s.md", "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/k9s-vs-53s.md", "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/qjs-vs-43s.md"]
---

# K9s vs 43s: preflop equity

K9s is a big favorite over 43s before the flop: 63.20% to 36.80% equity, counted exactly over every board, with the split by flop type and suit.

The exact count puts K9s at 63.20% and 43s at 36.80% when the two hands see all five board cards.

## K9s against 43s: the numbers

**Exact preflop results for K9s against 43s, in percent**

| Hand | Wins | Ties | Loses | Equity |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| K9s | 62.817 | 0.772 | 36.411 | 63.203 |
| 43s | 36.411 | 0.772 | 62.817 | 36.797 |

Both hands are suited hands: K9s and 43s. Neither hand shares a rank with the other, so this is a contest of high cards, connection and suits.

That is a modest edge, the kind that shows up over many hands and is easy to miss in one. Split pots make up 0.77% of the boards, and both equity figures count them as half a win each.

In the ranking of all 169 starting hands, K9s is number 29 and 43s is number 150.

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

| Hand | Boards won, about | Boards tied, about | Boards lost, about |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| K9s | 17,210,000 | 212,000 | 9,975,000 |
| 43s | 9,975,000 | 212,000 | 17,210,000 |

The total is exact: 16 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.

**K9s 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) |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| K9s | 1.718 | 1.592 | 2.746 | 0.582 |
| 43s | 0.582 | 2.746 | 1.592 | 1.718 |

In the last column, a pot-to-call ratio at or above the figure makes a call break even or better at this equity.

## Who is ahead on which flops

Rainbow flops topped by a ten or better are the best for K9s (66.63%); low rainbow flops (nine high or lower) are the worst (49.33%). K9s is the favorite overall but falls behind on low rainbow flops (nine high or lower).

**K9s against 43s by flop texture, in percent**

| Flop | Share of flops | K9s wins | Ties | 43s wins | K9s equity |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Rainbow, ten or higher | 25.220 | 66.448 | 0.358 | 33.194 | 66.627 |
| Rainbow, nine or lower | 5.689 | 48.880 | 0.897 | 50.223 | 49.329 |
| Two-tone | 46.727 | 62.274 | 0.416 | 37.310 | 62.482 |
| Monotone | 5.273 | 58.507 | 3.715 | 37.778 | 60.364 |
| Paired | 17.091 | 64.915 | 1.407 | 33.678 | 65.619 |

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

A random hand would give K9s 59.99% and 43s 38.64%. Against each other the change is +3.21 points for K9s and -1.84 for 43s.

**K9s 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 |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| K9s, all flops | 63.203 | 59.988 | +3.215 | 1.05359 |
| K9s, rainbow, ten or higher | 66.627 | 59.988 | +6.639 | 1.11067 |
| K9s, rainbow, nine or lower | 49.329 | 59.988 | -10.659 | 0.82231 |
| K9s, two-tone | 62.482 | 59.988 | +2.494 | 1.04157 |
| K9s, monotone | 60.364 | 59.988 | +0.376 | 1.00627 |
| K9s, paired | 65.619 | 59.988 | +5.631 | 1.09387 |
| 43s, all flops | 36.797 | 38.642 | -1.845 | 0.95225 |
| 43s, rainbow, ten or higher | 33.373 | 38.642 | -5.269 | 0.86365 |
| 43s, rainbow, nine or lower | 50.671 | 38.642 | +12.029 | 1.31129 |
| 43s, two-tone | 37.518 | 38.642 | -1.124 | 0.97091 |
| 43s, monotone | 39.636 | 38.642 | +0.994 | 1.02572 |
| 43s, paired | 34.381 | 38.642 | -4.261 | 0.88973 |

## Does a shared suit matter?

Suit overlap shows up in the numbers. With a suit in common K9s has 65.52% equity, and with none in common it has 62.43%. K9s does better with a shared suit, by 3.09 points.

**K9s against 43s by suit overlap, in percent**

| Deals | Specific deals | Share of deals | K9s wins | Ties | 43s wins | K9s equity |
| --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Share a suit | 4 | 25.00 | 65.094 | 0.859 | 34.047 | 65.523 |
| No shared suit | 12 | 75.00 | 62.058 | 0.743 | 37.199 | 62.430 |

## 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

With $100 from each side, the $200 pot is split on average as $126.40 for K9s and $73.60 for 43s; the first side gains $26.40 per all-in and the second gives up $26.40.

Over a long run, 1,000 deals split into about 628 for K9s, 364 for 43s and 8 tied.

## The same matchup from the other side

If you came looking for 43s against K9s, the numbers are the same with the hands swapped: 36.80% and 63.20%.

## Keep exploring

The calculator link fills in Ks9s 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 Ks9s against 4h3h in the equity calculator](https://georgelipoker.com/tools/equity-calculator.md#p1=Ks9s&p2=4h3h)
- [K9s combos](https://georgelipoker.com/combos/k9s.md)
- [43s combos](https://georgelipoker.com/combos/43s.md)
- [A5s vs 43s](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/a5s-vs-43s.md)
- [K9s vs 53s](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/k9s-vs-53s.md)
- [QJs vs 43s](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/qjs-vs-43s.md)
- [All hand matchups](https://georgelipoker.com/equity.md)

## 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.

## Related

- [A5s vs 43s: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/a5s-vs-43s.md)
- [K9s vs 53s: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/k9s-vs-53s.md)
- [QJs vs 43s: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/qjs-vs-43s.md)