What is a kicker?
by Max Drayman
November 15, 2006

To seasoned players this may seem like the dumbest question in the world. It's obvious isn't it? A kicker is your backup card, your tie-breaker, your silver bullet side card. Well yes and no! In my experience "kicker" is one of the most misunderstood terms for beginning Hold'Em players. Because of this we figured it would be worthwhile to get very specific about this.

Before we begin let's make sure we all understand Rule #1 in Texas Hold'Em. It's called the 5-Card Rule and it states that every final hand is made of five cards, no more and no less. You may not need to use all five of those cards to determine a winner but they are there nonetheless. You'll be getting off to a good start if you remember that and always have in mind what your final five cards are.

Ok, enough pre-amble. Strictly speaking a kicker is the highest un-paired card, or side card, in a player's hand. Remember, final hand is five cards, so the kicker is the highest non-paired card of those five.

If your final hand is KKJJ7 then the 7 is your kicker. If you end up with AA987 then it's the 9. And in 22AKT it's the Ace. So far it's easy, right?

Ok, what if you've got a Flush or a Straight and there are no "side cards"? Ok, since a kicker is the "highest non-paired" card in your hand your first kicker is simply your top card. In a JT987 Straight your kicker is the J. Your second kicker is the T but it won't come to that.

One very specific instance where second and third kickers, and on down the line, are very important indeed is with Flushes. In a QJ973 Flush the Q is the first kicker, the J is the second kicker, and so on. This is particularly important with Flushes because you'll often have to run through your Flush card by card --kicker by kicker-- to determine a winner in the (all too likely) event of an apparent tie over the Flush. If someone had an AQJ92 Flush in the same hand they would win because, in effect, their first kicker is an A and that beats the Q kicker in the QJ973 hand.

Is it possible to have a hand where you don't have a kicker? Sure, a Full House for instance has no un-paired side cards so no kicker. Can you go to your next high card to get one? No, certainly not! The 5-Card rule says so. (Some of you might laugh at this suggestion but you'd be surprised how many rookie players think that there is always a kicker, no matter what. As you may have guessed that's why I'm writing this article.)

I suspect the confusion over kickers comes from the oft quoted statement that "a kicker is the card you use to break ties". While this is certainly true in some instances it is not to be taken to mean that you can dig up a kicker whenever you need to break a tie. It's not that uncommon to have a tie in Hold'Em and split the pot accordingly.

In discussions of Hold'Em hands you'll often hear reference being made to a "high kicker" or a "low kicker". By now it should be obvious why a high card kicker is important: it may well be your tie-breaker. And a high kicker can really give strength to Pair, for instance, and make it playable where it might not be without it. Obviously a low kicker is much less powerful because of it's likelihood of being outclassed.

If you're at all confused about this kicker business I strongly recommend you start with the 5-Card Rule and work from there. What is your best 5-card hand? What is the highest non-paired card in that hand. This makes the "kicker" issue much more cut-and-dried.