Getting a Royal Flush in Video Poker – Everything You Need to Know!

The crème de la crème of almost every poker game is getting a Royal Flush. It’s not only a rare occurrence that can make jaws drop, but hitting a Royal Flush is usually something that will boost a bankroll by a ton. This is certainly the case in Video Pokers, which are simple games with potentially massive rewards.  

But how much will you actually make if you happen to hit a Royal Flush at a casino playing Video Poker and what is the likelihood of doing so? These are just two of the questions that we will be answering in the following article, along with explaining the optimal strategy of drawing to a Royal Flush.

Before we get to this, though, let us start with the basics to make sure that you know what a Royal Flush actually is. Many gamblers wrongly confuse the hand with a straight flush. Let’s not make that mistake. 

The Difference Between a Straight Flush and a Royal Flush

As you may or may not already know, a straight in any 5-card poker game is made up of five cards that are sequentially connected to each other, while a flush is five cards that are all of the same suit (♥, ♠, ♦ or ♣). Logically, a straight flush is therefore five cards of the same suit that are sequentially connected to each other.

The same can actually be said about a Royal Flush, which is also a colored straight. However, this hand is only created if the colored straight is made up of the five highest cards in the deck. In other words, the 10, Jack, Queen, King and Ace. Thus, it is much more difficult to hit a Royal Flush in Video Poker than it is hitting just a straight flush.

These are some of the straight flushes in Video Poker:

• 2♥, 3♥, 4♥, 5♥, 6♥
• 9♠, 10♠, J♠, Q♠, K♠
• 5♦, 6♦, 7♦, 8♦, 9♦
• 7♣, 8♣, 9♣, 10♣, J♣

These are the only four Royal Flushes in Video Poker:

• 10♥, J♥, Q♥, K♥, A♥
• 10♠, J♠, Q♠, K♠, A♠
• 10♦, J♦, Q♦, K♦, A♦
• 10♣, J♣, Q♣, K♣, A♣

How Much Does a Royal Flush Payout in Video Pokers Online?

This depends on two things; the version of the game that you’re playing and the coin level that you’re playing with. Many of the best Video Poker casinos in the UK have several different variants that can be enjoyed, such as Jacks or Better, Deuces Wild, Joker Poker, Jackpot Poker, All Aces and All American.

All of these games also have five different coin levels, which is a betting option. No matter the Video Poker you’re playing, you’re betting coins and the coin level decides how many you’re betting (1, 2, 3, 4 or 5). To get the right stake, you can also adjust a coin value that sets the amount of real cash that each coin should be worth.

What’s important to know and what is illustrated in the below table, is that you must play with the highest coin level to be able to get the highest payout from a Royal Flush in Video Poker.  

Royal Flush Payouts From Six Popular Video Pokers
	Jacks or Better	Deuces Wild	Joker Poker	Jackpot Poker	All Aces	All American
Coin Level 1	250x	250x	250x	1,000x	250x	250x
Coin Level 2	250x	250x	250x	1,000	250x	250x
Coin Level 3	250x	250x	250x	1,000x	250x	250x
Coin Level 4	250x	250x	250x	1,000x	250x	250x
Coin Level 5	800x	800x	800x	Progressive Jackpot	800x	800x

Please note that the above payouts are all listed as a multiplier to the stake that you’re playing with. So if you’re playing with a stake of £1 and get a 250x win from a Royal Flush, you would win £250.

As you can see, the payouts from a Royal Flush are very similar between the different Video Poker versions. The only one that stands out is Jackpot Poker which has the potential to pay a lot more. This game comes with a progressive jackpot that can pay tens of thousands of pounds if it’s been built up nicely. It also never pays any less than £5,000 as this is the jackpot’s starting value.

In Jackpot Poker the stake is only adjusted by the coin level and when this is set to the maximum one, you’re betting £5. This means that winning the jackpot will pay 1,000 times your stake at the very least and could potentially pay up to 10,000x.

These Are the Odds of Getting a Royal Flush in Video Poker

Like most gamblers, you’re probably wise enough to know that getting a Royal Flush while playing video poker is really difficult. Though, you may also think that it wouldn’t be too hard should you be spending a couple of hours on a session trying to achieve it. If you do believe this, you’re actually terribly wrong.

Let us assume that a hand of video poker takes 5 seconds to play. You would then be able to go through 12 hands every minute and 720 hands every hour. If you keep this up you would be expected to get your Royal Flush after playing straight for two days and 7 hours as the chance of hitting one is approximately 1 in 40,000 hands. This is probably way more than you thought, right?

While it may not be much of a comfort, we can tell you that you will come close to hitting one much more often. To illustrate this, let’s have a look at the chance of being dealt 1, 2, 3, 4 or 5 cards to a Royal Flush on the initial deal.

Chance of Being Dealt Part of a Royal Flush
Number of Cards to a Royal Flush	Chance of Being Dealt	Chance in %
1	1 in 6	16.7%
2	1 in 13	7.7%
3	1 in 92	1.09%
4	1 in 2,777	0.036%
5	1 in 649,740	0.00015%

As you can see, playing for just an hour would yield you as many as 7 game rounds where you get teased by getting dealt three cards to a Royal Flush. And if you make your session a really long one and play for about four hours, you will even be dealt a hand where only a single card is missing from the big hand.

This might make you wonder what the chances are to hit the cards that you need after the initial deal. Well, let us answer this by taking a look at it!

Chance of Hitting a Royal Flush After the Initial Deal
Number of Cards Needed When Drawing	Chance of Hitting the Royal Flush	Chance in %
1	1 in 47	v2.1%
2	1 in 1,081	0.094%
3	1 in 16,215	0.0062%
4	1 in 178,365	0.00056%
5	1 in 383,484	0.00026%

The most interesting part is the 1 in 47 chance that you have whenever you’re initially dealt four cards to a Royal Flush. While this only happens once every four hours or so (on average), when it does you can actually feel the big hit coming. However, 1 in 47 is still only 1 in 47 so 46 out of 47 times you’re going to miss. No matter how we twist and turn the probabilities, the fact won’t change that a Royal Flush only happens once on every 40,000th hand.

Do note that all of the above probabilities are based on the game Jacks or Better. If you’re playing with wild cards such as in Joker Poker (this has an extra wild joker) and Deuces Wilds (in this all 2’s are wilds) your chances will obviously be increased.

When Is the Right Time to Draw to a Royal Flush? Here’s the Perfect Strategy!

Playing Video Poker, you will encounter a ton of hands where you get two or more cards to a Royal Flush. For instance, checking the tables that we have listed above, you can see that two cards to a Royal is dealt as often 1 in 13 hands. While you may be tempted to go for the big prize, only a few of these hands should actually be used to go for the Royal if you want to play optimally. To maximize your long-term chances of winning in the game, it is usually much better to break the Royal draw and go for another hand.

To help you out making the right decisions, we have listed all of the possible Royal draw scenarios and mentioned when you should and should not go for the draw. This Royal Flush strategy applies to Jacks and Better only and not to Deuces Wild or Joker Poker.

Please also note that whenever we use the term ‘high pair’ or ‘high cards’, this means a pair of jacks or better or cards that are either jacks or better. Similarly, the term ‘low pair’ or ‘low card’ means a pair of 10’s or worse or cards that are either 10 or lower.

These Are the Hands That You Should Draw to a Royal Flush

• Flush with one card from a Royal (2♥, 10♥, J♥, Q♥, K♥)
• Straight with one card from a Royal (10♥, J♥, Q♠, K♥, A♥)
• High Pair with one card from a Royal (10♥, J♥, Q♥, Q♠, K♥)
• Low Pair with three cards from a Royal (4♠, 10♠, 10♥, Q♥, K♥)
• One card from a flush with two cards from a Royal (2♠, 5♥, 10♥, Q♥, K♥)
• One card from a straight with two cards from a Royal (2♠, 10♠, J♥, Q♥, K♥)
• One card from an inside straight with two high cards to a Royal (2♥, 10♣, J♣, Q♥, A♥)
• Three high cards and two high cards to a Royal (2♠, 4♠, J♣, Q♥, K♥)
• Two cards from a straight flush and two high cards to a Royal (5♠, 6♠, 8♠, K♥, A♥)

These Are the Hands You Should NOT Draw to a Royal Flush

• Straight flush that is already made (9♥, 10♥, J♥, Q♥, K♥)
  (keep the straight flush)
• Three of a kind with three cards to a Royal (J♥, Q♥, Q♠, Q♣, K♥)
  (keep the three of a kind)
• Flush with two cards from a Royal (2♥, 6♥, J♥, Q♥, K♥)
  (keep the flush)
• Straight with two cards from a Royal (10♥, J♥, Q♥, K♠, A♠)
  (keep the straight)
• Two Pair with two cards from a Royal (10♥, 10♠, J♥, J♠, Q♥)
  (keep the two pair)
• High Pair with two cards from a Royal (3♠, 10♥, J♥, Q♥, Q♠)
  (keep the pair)
• One card from a flush with three cards from a royal (2♠, 7♥, 8♥, Q♥, K♥)
  (go for the flush)
• Low pair with three cards from a royal (3♥, 6♠, 6♣, J♥, Q♥)
  (keep the pair)
• One card from an outside straight with three cards from a royal (2♣, 9♣, 10♠, J♥, Q♥)
  (go for the straight)
• Two cards from a straight flush with three cards from a royal (4♣, 5♣, 6♣, J♥, Q♥)
  (go for the straight flush)
• One card from a high inside straight with three cards from a Royal (7♣, 10♠, J♣, K♥, A♥)
  (go for the straight)
• Two cards from a straight flush and two cards to a Royal with a 10 included (2♠, 4♠, 7♥, 10♥, J♥)
  (go for the straight flush)
• Two high cards and two cards to a Royal with a 10 included (4♣, 6♣, 10♥, J♥, Q♠)
  (keep the QJ)

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