7-Stud is a game that stays true to its name as any player making it to the showdown will have seven cards in their hand. The goal of the game is to use five of those seven cards to make a poker hand and to beat the other players.

The game starts off with each player being dealt two cards face down and one card face up. After a round of betting, all remaining players are dealt another face up card. A fifth card face up is dealt after a second round of betting, with a third round of betting preceding the sixth card being dealt face up once again. A fourth round of betting comes after the sixth card is dealt and any players still remaining in the hand are dealt a seventh card face down (if there are more players than cards left, a single community card is placed face up in the centre of the table for all players to share). A final round of betting occurs and then the showdown happens.

This is the basic form of 7-Stud, although some of the subtleties are different depending on the specific variant that is being played. For example, original 7-Stud uses conventional poker hand rankings, with the highest hand taking down the pot. In this variant, the player with the lowest facing up card at the start is the one that is forced to open the betting rather than there being a blind system that works its way around the table.

In Razz, which is 7-Stud where the lowest hand wins the pot instead of the highest hand, that particular rule is usually reversed and the highest up card opens the betting as that would be the worst card in the reversed hand rankings of Razz. Finally, in 7-Stud/8 where half the pot is won by the highest and half by the lowest hand, the convention is usually to open the betting in the same way as original 7-Stud, although you will occasionally see home games where this particular rule is not observed.

That about does it for the basics of how each of these games work. Within those rules however, you will find that there is great variation in regards to betting strategies, starting hand selection and just about everything else under the sun. Poker is infinitely complex and the seven cards that each player left in at the showdown receives in 7-Stud makes it a perfect example of why that is the case.

Seven Card Poker in the modern era is almost always 7-Stud in one form or another, such as 7 Card Stud High Low. For more information on this excellent poker variant, take a look at our website.