--- title: "KQs vs A8s: preflop equity" url: "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/kqs-vs-a8s.md" canonical_url: "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/kqs-vs-a8s" last_updated: "2026-10-23" type: "reference" summary: "Who is ahead, KQs or A8s? A8s leads 56.91% to 43.10% before the flop, counted exactly over every board, with the split by flop type and suit." related: ["https://georgelipoker.com/equity/kqs-vs-kts.md", "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/kqs-vs-kqo.md", "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/66-vs-a8s.md"] --- # KQs vs A8s: preflop equity Who is ahead, KQs or A8s? A8s leads 56.91% to 43.10% before the flop, counted exactly over every board, with the split by flop type and suit. Dealt all in against each other, A8s takes 56.90% of the pot on average and KQs takes the other 43.10%. ## KQs against A8s: the numbers **Exact preflop results for KQs against A8s, in percent** | Hand | Wins | Ties | Loses | Equity | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | KQs | 42.845 | 0.500 | 56.655 | 43.095 | | A8s | 56.655 | 0.500 | 42.845 | 56.905 | The matchup is suited hands on both sides, KQs against A8s. With no overlap in ranks, every card that pairs one hand is a card that does not pair the other. That is a modest edge, the kind that shows up over many hands and is easy to miss in one. Ties are 0.50% of the outcomes here; each tied board gives both hands half the pot. KQs ranks number 16 of 169 starting hands, and A8s ranks number 21, by equity against a random hand. **Boards behind the percentages: 27,396,864 counted in all** | Hand | Boards won, about | Boards tied, about | Boards lost, about | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | KQs | 11,738,000 | 137,000 | 15,522,000 | | A8s | 15,522,000 | 137,000 | 11,738,000 | 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. **KQs against A8s read as odds** | Hand | Equity as odds (to 1) | Wins one deal in | Loses one deal in | Pot odds needed to call (to 1) | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | KQs | 0.757 | 2.334 | 1.765 | 1.320 | | A8s | 1.320 | 1.765 | 2.334 | 0.757 | The last column is the break-even price: the pot odds a call needs to offer, as a ratio of pot to call. ## Who is ahead on which flops Across the five flop textures A8s' equity moves by 24.33 points, from 50.64% on rainbow flops topped by a ten or better to 74.97% on low rainbow flops (nine high or lower). A8s stays ahead on all five textures, but the swing between them is large, so how the flop looks matters a great deal. **KQs against A8s by flop texture, in percent** | Flop | Share of flops | KQs wins | Ties | A8s wins | KQs equity | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Rainbow, ten or higher | 23.867 | 49.298 | 0.115 | 50.587 | 49.356 | | Rainbow, nine or lower | 7.042 | 24.571 | 0.919 | 74.510 | 25.030 | | Two-tone | 46.727 | 44.169 | 0.263 | 55.568 | 44.300 | | Monotone | 5.273 | 43.954 | 3.411 | 52.635 | 45.660 | | Paired | 17.091 | 37.403 | 0.612 | 61.985 | 37.709 | A rainbow flop shows three suits, a two-tone flop repeats one suit, a monotone flop is a single suit, and a paired flop repeats a rank. ## Compared with a random hand How much does the opponent matter? Compared with its random-hand 63.40%, KQs changes by -20.30 points, and A8s, from 61.94%, by -5.04. **KQs and A8s 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 | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | KQs, all flops | 43.095 | 63.400 | -20.305 | 0.67973 | | KQs, rainbow, ten or higher | 49.356 | 63.400 | -14.044 | 0.77849 | | KQs, rainbow, nine or lower | 25.030 | 63.400 | -38.370 | 0.39479 | | KQs, two-tone | 44.300 | 63.400 | -19.100 | 0.69874 | | KQs, monotone | 45.660 | 63.400 | -17.740 | 0.72019 | | KQs, paired | 37.709 | 63.400 | -25.691 | 0.59478 | | A8s, all flops | 56.905 | 61.944 | -5.039 | 0.91865 | | A8s, rainbow, ten or higher | 50.644 | 61.944 | -11.300 | 0.81758 | | A8s, rainbow, nine or lower | 74.970 | 61.944 | +13.026 | 1.21029 | | A8s, two-tone | 55.700 | 61.944 | -6.244 | 0.89920 | | A8s, monotone | 54.340 | 61.944 | -7.604 | 0.87724 | | A8s, paired | 62.291 | 61.944 | +0.347 | 1.00560 | ## Does a shared suit matter? Two kinds of deal exist here. In 4 of them the hands share a suit and A8s holds 58.79%. In 12 they do not, and it holds 56.28%. A8s does better with a shared suit, by 2.51 points. **KQs against A8s by suit overlap, in percent** | Deals | Specific deals | Share of deals | KQs wins | Ties | A8s wins | KQs equity | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Share a suit | 4 | 25.00 | 40.922 | 0.578 | 58.500 | 41.211 | | No shared suit | 12 | 75.00 | 43.486 | 0.473 | 56.041 | 43.723 | ## How often this matchup comes up Counting specific cards, KQs against A8s 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 A $100 all-in from each player makes a $200 pot, and the exact equity says A8s gets $113.80 of it on average and KQs gets $86.20. Out of 1,000 deals you should see around 567 outright wins for A8s, 428 for KQs, and 5 split pots. ## The same matchup from the other side A8s against KQs adds nothing new: it is 56.90% for A8s and 43.10% for KQs, the same figures reversed. ## Keep exploring Open the calculator with KsQs against Ah8h already entered, a deal with no shared suit, and change any card to try your own hand. The matchups after it each swap one hand for a nearby one in the ranking. - [Open KsQs against Ah8h in the equity calculator](https://georgelipoker.com/tools/equity-calculator.md#p1=KsQs&p2=Ah8h) - [KQs combos](https://georgelipoker.com/combos/kqs.md) - [A8s combos](https://georgelipoker.com/combos/a8s.md) - [KQs vs KTs](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/kqs-vs-kts.md) - [KQs vs KQo](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/kqs-vs-kqo.md) - [66 vs A8s](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/66-vs-a8s.md) - [All hand matchups](https://georgelipoker.com/equity.md) ## How this was computed This is an exact count with no sampling. For the 16 ways to deal one KQs and one A8s without reusing a card, grouped by suit pattern, every one of the 1,712,304 possible boards is dealt and both seven-card hands are compared. A tie counts as half a win in the equity column, and each board is counted once under each of its ten three-card flops. Source: our own exact count from the GeorgeLiPoker poker math library. No outside data is used. ## Related - [KQs vs KTs: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/kqs-vs-kts.md) - [KQs vs KQo: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/kqs-vs-kqo.md) - [66 vs A8s: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/66-vs-a8s.md)