The poker strategy has grown and developed tremendously over the years. Many things we thought we knew about the game have become obsolete due to new findings and advancements in the GTO strategy. However, one fundamental aspect remains consistent.
We are talking about preflop opening ranges, which remain essential to your long-term success on the felt. Regardless of your other skills, without a very solid understanding of preflop play, it’s virtually impossible to be a profitable player.
For that reason, we’ll revisit optimal opening ranges for cash games when playing 100 big blinds deep.
We’ll cover every single position, giving you a quick overview of the main group of hands that you should be opening, looking to give you a ready-made blueprint you can take straight to the tables.
UTG – Opening 10%
When you are first to act and have eight other players behind, the only correct approach is to play very tight. From UTG, you should be opening only 10% of your hands, as shown in the picture below.
Our UTG opening range breaks down to:
- Only the strongest off-suite ace-high hands (AK and AQ)
- All suited aces except A3s and A2s
- A7s and A6s are opening only about one third of the time
- Pocket pairs down to 99 & 88 about 60% of the time
- Suited broadways: KQs, KJs, KTs, QJs, and JTs
You’ll notice that other hands are either pure folds or open a small percentage of the time. For example, all pocket pairs under 88 are fairly standard folds from UTG, and the only off-suit broadway hand that opens about 40% of the time is KQo.
You can add a few suited hands to your opening range for some balance, such as 65s and K5s, but you are supposed to raise with them only about 20% of the time. This is to say that you shouldn’t be routinely opening with them, which is something that many players do at lower stakes.
UTG+1 – Opening 11.5%
Moving one position to the left, playing from UTG+1, your optimal opening range doesn’t change much. The total percentage increases to 11.5%:
In addition to all the hands we’re raising from UTG, we can now also add hands like AJo and KJo, but these hands are still folds a majority of the time. You can raise with them 10% to 20%, but anything more than that will be too wide.
UTG+2 – Opening 13%
With two players out of the picture, we can slowly start to increase our opening range. Playing from UTG+2, we can safely raise with just over 13% of our entire range.
As you can see in the picture, the biggest differences are:
- AJo is now a fairly standard open
- We can open more of our pocket pairs (down to 77 and even 66)
- All suited kings down to K9s raise 100% of the time
- T9s also become a standard open
At a full-ring table, this is still an early position, so we can’t afford to go too wide. Our opening range remains quite tight, but we can add a few more hands to our repertoire.
Lojack – Opening 15.9%
Playing from the lojack position, we should be opening close to 16% of our range, so there are more opportunities to go after the blinds.
- We are now opening all off-suit aces down to AJ & AT about 50% of the time
- All suited aces open 100% of the time except A2s
- Suited kings down to K8s
- All pocket pairs down to 77 open 100%, while 66 – 44 mix between raising and folding
- KJo opens about 70% of the time
It is important to note that off-suit broadways except KQo and KJo are still pretty standard folds playing from this position. Also, hands like middling suited connectors are largely pure folds (despite the fact they look very playable).
While you should have some opens with hands like 76s, 65s, and 54s, hands like 98s, 97s, and 87s are folded 100% of the time, as they can get you in tricky spots with weak top or middle pairs.
Hijack – Opening 19.8%
Hijack is the first position where our opening range should start getting wider. From this particular position, we should be opening with around 20%:
Playing from hijack, we can start including hands like:
- Off-suit broadways down to QT
- All pocket pairs with some frequency (although the lowest pairs are still folds most of the time)
- Mixing in suited connectors like T8s and 98s
- All suited aces
- Off-suit aces down to AT
- Suited Kings down to K5s
With fewer players to go through and less chances of getting 3-bet, the hijack opening range is a bit more flexible. Still, as you can see, many hands that a lot of players would routinely open at a cash game table don’t make the cut at all or open very infrequently.
Cutoff – Opening 25.6%
The cutoff is the first position where we see a serious increase in our optimal opening range, as we are supposed to open with over 25% of all hands:
Compared to previous positions, we are now expanding to include:
- All off-suit aces down to A9 at 100%
- Suited kings down to K4s at 100%
- We always raise with pocket pairs down to 55
- Suited queens down to Q6s become good opens
- Suited connectors like 98s, 97s, and 87s finally become good raising hands
We only have three players to get through, and there is only one player in position to us, which makes it possible to open wider and either win the blinds before the flop or play the flop in position more often than not.
Button – Opening 40.5%
While opening ranges from one position to another tend to change only slightly, there is a big change moving from cutoff to button. Playing from the button, you should be opening 40% of your entire range:
The reason for this is two-fold. First of all, you are raising two players who had to put the money into the pot without looking at their cards. Secondly, no matter what happens, you are always guaranteed to play in position after the flop.
Because of these factors, our button raising range comprises:
- All suited aces & all off-suite aces down to A4
- All suited kings, suited queens down to Q3, and suited jacks down to J5
- Off-suit broadways down to Q9
- Suited connectors down to 54s
- Suited one-gappers down to 75s
- All pocket pairs
Playing from the button, we have the best possible position at the table, and our raising range reflects that fact.
Small Blind – Opening 46.4%
The final position we’ll look at is the small blind. If it so happens that the action folds to you and you have the first option, you should be raising with over 46% of your entire range:
The small blind raising range is even wider than that on the button as you only have one player to go through, and they have two random cards. We can freely raise with:
- All aces except A2o
- All suited broadways except J2s
- Off-suit broadways down to J8o
- Suited tens down to T5s
- Almost all suited connectors and one-gappers
As you can see, the only hands we are not raising are the weakest off-suit connectors (from 87o and below), the lowest suited connectors, and hands with very poor playability, such as T5o, 93o, 83s, etc.
