Blind Stealing: What a Button Raise Has to Fold Out
Blind stealing is a raise from a late seat, when everyone before you has folded, to take the blinds' 1.5bb. The basic math is a bluff's: a 2.5bb button raise has to fold out both blinds 62.5% of the time if the hand had no equity. In practice the hand keeps some equity when called, so it needs fewer folds.
A♠5♠ on the button, folded to you
Six-handed, everyone folds to you on the button with A♠5♠, 100bb deep. Fold, raise to 2.2bb or raise to 3.5bb?
See the answer
What a raise has to fold out if it had no equity, against the blinds' 1.5bb:
| Button raise | Folds needed for a pure steal |
|---|---|
| 2.2bb | 59.5% |
| 3.5bb | 70% |
If a blind calls, A♠5♠ keeps equity against the hands it defends:
| Blind's hand | A♠5♠'s equity |
|---|---|
| T♥2♦ | 66.5% |
| K♦9♣ | 61.6% |
| Q♥J♦ | 59.1% |
| J♣6♣ | 58.6% |
| K♥Q♥ | 56.8% |
| 8♥7♥ | 55.2% |
| 4♣4♦ | 48.1% |
| A♦T♣ | 34.3% |
A♠5♠ has more than 55% against every unpaired hand without an ace in this table. The small raise costs 1.3bb less and needs fewer folds. The expected answer is the raise to 2.2bb.
The price of a steal by size
| Raise | What it risks | Folds needed for a pure steal |
|---|---|---|
| 2.2bb | 2.2bb | 59.5% |
| 2.5bb | 2.5bb | 62.5% |
| 3bb | 3bb | 66.7% |
| 3.5bb | 3.5bb | 70% |
From the cutoff the price is the same, but the button also acts after you: three players have to fold instead of two.
Keep going
- Stealing from the small blind: small blind strategy.
- The seat that defends against the steal: big blind defense vs button.
- Why the button steals the most: poker positions.
- What the small raise has to fold out: how often a bluff must work.
- The spot's hand: suited aces.
- One spot every day: the daily poker puzzle.
Sources
- Every equity is computed by exact enumeration with the app's equity module, and every frequency with its pot odds module, checked on October 11, 2026.
- The answer to the spot follows rules written by the app's author; it does not come from a solver.