--- title: "T9s vs 87s: preflop equity" url: "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/t9s-vs-87s.md" canonical_url: "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/t9s-vs-87s" last_updated: "2026-10-23" type: "reference" summary: "T9s is a big favorite over 87s before the flop: 64.45% to 35.55% equity, counted exactly over every board, with the split by flop type and suit." related: ["https://georgelipoker.com/equity/t9s-vs-86s.md", "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/t9s-vs-76s.md", "https://georgelipoker.com/equity/33-vs-87s.md"] --- # T9s vs 87s: preflop equity T9s is a big favorite over 87s before the flop: 64.45% to 35.55% equity, counted exactly over every board, with the split by flop type and suit. The exact count puts T9s at 64.45% and 87s at 35.55% when the two hands see all five board cards. ## T9s against 87s: the numbers **Exact preflop results for T9s against 87s, in percent** | Hand | Wins | Ties | Loses | Equity | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | T9s | 63.580 | 1.738 | 34.682 | 64.449 | | 87s | 34.682 | 1.738 | 63.580 | 35.551 | This is a contest between two suited hands, T9s and 87s. With no overlap in ranks, every card that pairs one hand is a card that does not pair the other. The lead is steady rather than large, and the flop still has plenty of say in who wins. Ties are 1.74% of the outcomes here; each tied board gives both hands half the pot. Place 64 of 169 belongs to T9s and place 100 belongs to 87s in the ranking against a random hand. **Boards behind the percentages: 27,396,864 counted in all** | Hand | Boards won, about | Boards tied, about | Boards lost, about | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | T9s | 17,419,000 | 476,000 | 9,502,000 | | 87s | 9,502,000 | 476,000 | 17,419,000 | 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. **T9s against 87s read as odds** | Hand | Equity as odds (to 1) | Wins one deal in | Loses one deal in | Pot odds needed to call (to 1) | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | T9s | 1.813 | 1.573 | 2.883 | 0.552 | | 87s | 0.552 | 2.883 | 1.573 | 1.813 | 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, T9s peaks at 68.53% on rainbow flops topped by a ten or better and bottoms out at 51.20% on low rainbow flops (nine high or lower). T9s stays ahead on all five textures, but the swing between them is large, so how the flop looks matters a great deal. **T9s against 87s by flop texture, in percent** | Flop | Share of flops | T9s wins | Ties | 87s wins | T9s equity | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Rainbow, ten or higher | 25.220 | 67.948 | 1.164 | 30.888 | 68.530 | | Rainbow, nine or lower | 5.689 | 51.097 | 0.202 | 48.701 | 51.198 | | Two-tone | 46.727 | 63.663 | 0.897 | 35.440 | 64.111 | | Monotone | 5.273 | 59.524 | 3.831 | 36.645 | 61.439 | | Paired | 17.091 | 62.313 | 4.750 | 32.937 | 64.688 | 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 A random hand would give T9s 54.03% and 87s 47.94%. Against each other the change is +10.42 points for T9s and -12.39 for 87s. **T9s and 87s 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 | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | T9s, all flops | 64.449 | 54.028 | +10.421 | 1.19288 | | T9s, rainbow, ten or higher | 68.530 | 54.028 | +14.502 | 1.26842 | | T9s, rainbow, nine or lower | 51.198 | 54.028 | -2.830 | 0.94762 | | T9s, two-tone | 64.111 | 54.028 | +10.083 | 1.18663 | | T9s, monotone | 61.439 | 54.028 | +7.411 | 1.13717 | | T9s, paired | 64.688 | 54.028 | +10.660 | 1.19731 | | 87s, all flops | 35.551 | 47.936 | -12.385 | 0.74163 | | 87s, rainbow, ten or higher | 31.470 | 47.936 | -16.466 | 0.65650 | | 87s, rainbow, nine or lower | 48.802 | 47.936 | +0.866 | 1.01807 | | 87s, two-tone | 35.889 | 47.936 | -12.047 | 0.74869 | | 87s, monotone | 38.561 | 47.936 | -9.375 | 0.80443 | | 87s, paired | 35.312 | 47.936 | -12.624 | 0.73665 | ## Does a shared suit matter? Suit overlap shows up in the numbers. With a suit in common T9s has 66.99% equity, and with none in common it has 63.60%. T9s does better with a shared suit, by 3.39 points. **T9s against 87s by suit overlap, in percent** | Deals | Specific deals | Share of deals | T9s wins | Ties | 87s wins | T9s equity | | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | --- | | Share a suit | 4 | 25.00 | 66.051 | 1.882 | 32.067 | 66.992 | | No shared suit | 12 | 75.00 | 62.756 | 1.690 | 35.554 | 63.601 | ## How often this matchup comes up Counting specific cards, T9s against 87s 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 $128.90 for T9s and $71.10 for 87s; the first side gains $28.90 per all-in and the second gives up $28.90. Think in thousands: about 636 of 1,000 go to T9s, about 347 go to 87s, and about 17 are chopped. ## The same matchup from the other side One page covers both views. From 87s' side the equity is 35.55%, and from T9s' side it is 64.45%. ## Keep exploring Ts9s against 8h7h 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 Ts9s against 8h7h in the equity calculator](https://georgelipoker.com/tools/equity-calculator.md#p1=Ts9s&p2=8h7h) - [T9s combos](https://georgelipoker.com/combos/t9s.md) - [87s combos](https://georgelipoker.com/combos/87s.md) - [T9s vs 86s](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/t9s-vs-86s.md) - [T9s vs 76s](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/t9s-vs-76s.md) - [33 vs 87s](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/33-vs-87s.md) - [All hand matchups](https://georgelipoker.com/equity.md) ## How this was computed The page is built from a full enumeration: 1,712,304 boards, every suit pattern of the 16 specific deals, both seven-card hands evaluated. A tie is worth half a win to each hand, and a board is tallied under each of its ten possible flops for the texture rows. Source: our own exact count from the GeorgeLiPoker poker math library. No outside data is used. ## Related - [T9s vs 86s: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/t9s-vs-86s.md) - [T9s vs 76s: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/t9s-vs-76s.md) - [33 vs 87s: preflop equity](https://georgelipoker.com/equity/33-vs-87s.md)